UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 


THE  GIFT  OF 

MAY  TREAT  MORRISON 

IN  MEMORY  OF 

ALEXANDER  F  MORRISON 


I  Page  30 


WELCOME   TO    BANGI.ETOP' 


The  Water  Ghost 
and  Others 


JOHN   KENDRICK   BANGS 

AUTHOR    OF    "COFFEE   AND    REPARTEE* 


ILLUSTRATED 


NEW    YORK 
HARPER    &    BROTHERS    PUBLISHERS 

I  894 


BY  JOHN  KENDRICK  BANGS. 

COFFEE  AND  REPARTEE. 
THREE  WEEKS  IN  POLITICS. 

Illustrated.    321x0,  Cloth,  Ornamental,  50  cents  each. 


PUBLISHED  BY  HARPER  &  BROTHERS,  NEW  YOKK. 


.  sale  by  all  bootseHers,  or  will  be  sent  by  the 

yatlishers,  "^oflafe  \p*&d$d,  *fo  any  part  of  the    United 
States,  Cayatf,  or^njci^o^n  Receipt  of  price. 


Copyright,  1894,  by  HARPER  &  BROTHERS. 
All  rights  reserved. 


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FRANCIS  SEDGWICK  BANGS 


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CONTENTS 


THE  WATER   GHOST   OF   HARROWBY 

HALL I 

THE    SPECTRE    COOK    OF    BANGLETOP       .  2O 

THE   SPECK    ON    THE    LENS        ....  104 

A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR      .       .       ...       .       .  121 

A    QUICKSILVER    CASSANDRA     ....  165 

THE   GHOST   CLUB.       . 174 

A    PSYCHICAL    PRANK 233 

THE     LITERARY     REMAINS     OF     THOMAS 

BRAGDON 247 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


PAGE 

"' WELCOME   TO   BANGLETOP '"     .       .      .     Frontispiece 

A  DEPARTING  COOK 25 

THE  BARON'S  BREAKFAST  WAS  NOT      ...  31 

PAY-DAY 37 

TERWILLIGER  TO  THE  RESCUE 51 

"COOK!"  HE  WHISPERED 55 

THE  PRESENCE  HAD  ASSUMED  SHAPE    ...  59 

"'NO  TAIKERS,'  RETORTED  THE  GHOST"     .  63 

THEY  SHOOK  HANDS  AND  PARTED  ....  73 

THE  H'EARL  OF  MUGLEY 79 

"'TO  ARIADNE,  OF  COURSE'" 87 

"A  DUKE  IS  A  DUKE  THE  WORLD  OVER"    .  95 

BACK  TO  THE  SPIRIT  VALE IOI 

"MARTYRS'  NIGHT" 123 

"DO  YOU  HEAR  THAT  BOLT  SLIDE?"   ...  13! 

THE  VISITOR  ARRIVES 135 

"I  LOOKED  UPON  MY  REFLECTION  IN  THE 

GLASS" 141 

THE  RED  TIE 145 

"  NOT  A  CARD  FELL " 149 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

"'GRAB   HOLD   OF   ME,  BOYS "' 153 

"i  MUST  HAVE  FAINTED" 157 

THE    MIND -READING    FEATS    ON    THE    CLUB'S 

BUTLER l6l 

"5010" 175 

"PEGGING  SHOES  LIKE  A  GENTLEMAN"  .  .  179 

5OIO  BECOMES  EXCITED 185 

"NO  LESS  A  PERSON  THAN  HAWLEY  HICKS  "  IQI 

"'JUST  WATCH  ME'" IQ7 

NOAH  AND  DAVY  CROCKETT 2OI 

SOLOMON  AND  DOCTOR  JOHNSON  ....  2O$ 

MOZART  TRIES  HIS  HAND  AT  THE  BANJO  .  2og 

WAITING  FOR  THE  CRITICS 213 

NAPOLEON  BONAPARTE  AND  THE  DUKE  OF 

WELLINGTON  .  .  ^ 217 

THE  GIFT  OF  THE  SPOONS 221 

"'LET  ME  SHAAK  DTHOT  HAND'".  .  .  .  229 
"HE  WAS  IN  AN  UNUSUALLY  EXUBERANT 

MOOD" 249 

ON  A  SPIRIT  SHIP 253 

"MORE  BEAUTIFUL  THAN  THE  REALITY"  .  257 

GIUSEPPE  ZOCCO 263 

"BUT  FINALLY  I  OPENED  THE  BOX  "  .  .  .  271 
"GAZING  INTO  THE  FIRE  WAS  TOM  BRAG- 

DON" 281 

"'YOU  COIN*  TO  KEEP  A  DIARY?'"  .  .  .  293 


THE   WATER  GHOST  OF  HAR- 
ROWBY   HALL 

THE  trouble  with  Harrowby  Hall  was 
that  it  was  haunted,  and,  what  was  worse, 
the  ghost  did  not  content  itself  with  merely 
appearing  at  the  bedside  of  the  afflicted 
person  who  saw  it,  but  persisted  in  remain 
ing  there  for  one  mortal  hour  before  it 
would  disappear. 

It  never  appeared  except  on  Christmas 
Eve,  and  then  as  the  clock  was  striking 
twelve,  in  which  respect  alone  was  it  lack 
ing  in  that  originality  which  in  these  days 
is  a  sine  qua  non  of  success  in  spectral  life. 
The  owners  of  Harrowby  Hall  had  done 
their  utmost  to  rid  themselves  of  the  damp 
and  dewy  lady  who  rose  up  out  of  the 
best  bedroom  floor  at  midnight,  but  with 
out  avail.  They  had  tried  stopping  the 
clock,  so  that  the  ghost  would  not  know 


THE    WATER    GHOST 


•  ifrhen  it\w*ag  :ffHdn?ght ;  but  she  made  her 
appearance 'just  tlie.jsame,  with  that  fearful 

Ijriijrfiiaficf  J)erio.tfaljty  of  hers,  and  there 
she  would  stand  until  everything  about  her 
was  thoroughly  saturated. 

Then  the  owners  of  Harrowby  Hall 
calked  up  every  crack  in  the  floor  with  the 
very  best  quality  of  hemp,  and  over  this 
were  placed  layers  of  tar  and  canvas  ;  the 
walls  were  made  water-proof,  and  the  doors 
and  windows  likewise,  the  proprietors  hav 
ing  conceived  the  notion  that  the  unexor- 
cised  lady  would  find  it  difficult  to  leak 
into  the  room  after  these  precautions  had 
been  taken  ;  but  even  this  did  not  suffice. 
The  following  Christmas  Eve  she  appeared 
as  promptly  as  before,  and  frightened  the  oc 
cupant  of  the  room  quite  out  of  his  senses 
by  sitting  down  alongside  of  him  and  gazing 
with  her  cavernous  blue  eyes  into  his ;  and 
he  noticed,  too,  that  in  her  long,  aqueously 
bony  fingers  bits  of  dripping  sea-weed  were 
entwined,  the  ends  hanging  down,  and  these 
ends  she  drew  across  his  forehead  until 
he  became  like  one  insane.  And  then  he 
swooned  away,  and  was  found  unconscious 


THE   WATER   GHOST  3 

in  his  bed  the  next  morning  by  his  host, 
simply  saturated  with  sea-water  and  fright, 
from  the  combined  effects  of  which  he 
never  recovered,  dying  four  years  later  of 
pneumonia  and  nervous  prostration  at  the 
age  of  seventy-eight. 

The  next  year  the  master  of  Harrowby 
Hall  decided  not  to  have  the  best  spare 
bedroom  opened  at  all,  thinking  that  per 
haps  the  ghost's  thirst  for  making  herself 
disagreeable  would  be  satisfied  by  haunting 
the  furniture,  but  the  plan  was  as  unavail 
ing  as  the  many  that  had  preceded  it. 

The  ghost  appeared  as  usual  in  the  room 
—  that  is,  it  was  supposed  she  did,  for 
the  hangings  were  dripping  wet  the  next 
morning,  and  in  the  parlor  below  the  haunt 
ed  room  a  great  damp  spot  appeared  on 
the  ceiling.  Finding  no  one  there,  she 
immediately  set  out  to  learn  the  reason 
why,  and  she  chose  none  other  to  haunt 
than  the  owner  of  the  Harrowby  himself. 
She  found  him  in  his  own  cosey  room  drink 
ing  whiskey — whiskey  undiluted — and  fe 
licitating  himself  upon  having  foiled  her 
ghostship,  when  all  of  a  sudden  the  curl 


4  THE    WATER    GHOST 

went  out  of  his  hair,  his  whiskey  bottle 
filled  and  overflowed,  and  he  was  himself 
in  a  condition  similar  to  that  of  a  man  who 
has  fallen  into  a  water-butt.  When  he  re 
covered  from  the  shock,  which  was  a  pain 
ful  one,  he  saw  before  him  the  lady  of  the 
cavernous  eyes  and  sea-weed  fingers.  The 
sight  was  so  unexpected  and  so  terrifying 
that  he  fainted,  but  immediately  came  to, 
because  of  the  vast  amount  of  water  in  his 
hair,  which,  trickling  down  over  his  face, 
restored  his  consciousness. 

Now  it  so  happened  that  the  master  of 
Harrowby  was  a  brave  man,  and  while  he 
was  not  particularly  fond  of  interviewing 
ghosts,  especially  such  quenching  ghosts 
as  the  one  before  him,  he  was  not  to  be 
daunted  by  an  apparition.  He  had  paid 
the  lady  the  compliment  of  fainting  from 
the  effects  of  his  first  surprise,  and  now 
that  he  had  come  to  he  intended  to  find 
out  a  few  things  he  felt  he  had  a  right  to 
know.  He  would  have  liked  to  put  on  a 
dry  suit  of  clothes  first,  but  the  apparition 
declined  to  leave  him  *or  an  instant  until 
her  hour  was  up,  and  he  was  forced  to  deny 


THE    WATER   GHOST  5 

himself  that  pleasure.  Every  time  he  would 
move  she  would  follow  him,  with  the  result 
that  everything  she  came  in  contact  with 
got  a  ducking.  In  an  effort  to  warm  himself 
up  he  approached  the  fire,  an  unfortunate 
move  as  it  turned  out,  because  it  brought 
the  ghost  directly  over  the  fire,  which  im 
mediately  was  extinguished.  The  whis 
key  became  utterly  valueless  as  a  comforter 
to  his  chilled  system,  because  it  was  by  this 
time  diluted  to  a  proportion  of  ninety  per 
cent,  of  water.  The  only  thing  he  could  do 
to  ward  off  the  evil  effects  of  his  encounter 
he  did,  and  that  was  to  swallow  ten  two- 
grain  quinine  pills,  which  he  managed  to 
put  into  his  mouth  before  the  ghost  had 
time  to  interfere.  Having  done  this,  he 
turned  with  some  asperity  to  the  ghost,  and 
said  : 

"  Far  be  it  from  me  to  be  impolite  to 
a  woman,  madam,  but  I'm  hanged  if  it 
wouldn't  please  me  better  if  you'd  stop 
these  infernal  visits  of  yours  to  this  house. 
Go  sit  out  on  the  lake,  if  you  like  that  sort 
of  thing ;  soak  the  water-butt,  if  you  wish ; 
but  do  not,  I  implore  you,  come  into  a  gen- 


6  THE    WATER    GHOST 

tleman's  house  and  saturate  him  and  his 
possessions  in  this  way.  It  is  damned  dis 
agreeable." 

"  Henry  Hartwick  Oglethorpe,"  said  the 
ghost,  in  a  gurgling  voice,  "  you  don't  know 
what  you  are  talking  about." 

"  Madam,"  returned  the  unhappy  house 
holder,  "  I  wish  that  remark  were  strictly 
truthful.  I  was  talking  about  you.  It 
would  be  shillings  and  pence — nay,  pounds, 
in  my  pocket,  madam,  if  I  did  not  know 
you." 

"That  is  a  bit  of  specious  nonsense,"  re 
turned  the  ghost,  throwing  a  quart  of  indig 
nation  into  the  face  of  the  master  of  Har- 
rowby.  "  It  may  rank  high  as  repartee, 
but  as  a  comment  upon  my  statement  that 
you  do  not  know  what  you  are  talking 
about,  it  savors  of  irrelevant  impertinence. 
You  do  not  know  that  I  am  compelled  to 
haunt  this  place  year  after  year  by  inexor 
able  fate.  It  is  no  pleasure  to  me  to  enter 
this  house,  and  ruin  and  mildew  everything 
I  touch.  I  never  aspired  to  be  a  shower- 
bath,  but  it  is  my  doom.  Do  you  know 
who  I  am  ?" 


THE    WATER   GHOST  7 

"  No,  I  don't,"  returned  the  master  of 
Harrowby.  "  I  should  say  you  were  the 
Lady  of  the  Lake,  or  Little  Sallie  Waters." 

"You  are  a  witty  man  for  your  years," 
said  the  ghost. 

"  Well,  my  humor  is  drier  than  yours 
ever  will  be,"  returned  the  master. 

"  No  doubt.  I'm  never  dry.  I  am  the 
Water  Ghost  of  Harrowby  Hall,  and  dry- 
ness  is  a  quality  entirely  beyond  my  wildest 
hope.  I  have  been  the  incumbent  of  this 
highly  unpleasant  office  for  two  hundred 
years  to-night." 

"  How  the  deuce  did  you  ever  come  to 
get  elected  ?"  asked  the  master. 

"  Through  a  suicide,"  replied  the  spectre. 
"  I  am  the  ghost  of  that  fair  maiden  whose 
picture  hangs  over  the  mantel-piece  in  the 
drawing  -  room.  I  should  have  been  your 
great-great-great-great-great-aunt  if  I  had 
lived,  Henry  Hartwick  Oglethorpe,  for  I 
was  the  own  sister  of  your  great-great-great- 
great  grandfather." 

"  But  what  induced  you  to  get  this  house 
into  such  a  predicament  ?" 

"  I  was  not  to  blame,  sir,"  returned  the 


8  THE    WATER    GHOST 

lady.  "It  was  my  father's  fault.  He  it 
was  who  built  Harrowby  Hall,  and  the 
haunted  chamber  was  to  have  been  mine. 
My  father  had  it  furnished  in  pink  and  yel 
low,  knowing  well  that  blue  and  gray  formed 
the  only  combination  of  color  I  could  tol 
erate.  He  did  it  merely  to  spite  me,  and, 
with  what  I  deem  a  proper  spirit,  I  declined 
to  live  in  the  room ;  whereupon  my  father 
said  I  could  live  there  or  on  the  lawn,  he 
didn't  care  which.  That  night  I  ran  from 
the  house  and  jumped  over  the  cliff  into 
the  sea." 

"That  was  rash,"  said  the  master  of  Har 
rowby. 

"So  I've  heard,"  returned  the  ghost.  "If 
I  had  known  what  the  consequences  were 
to  be  I  should  not  have  jumped;  but  I 
really  never  realized  what  I  was  doing 
until  after  I  was  drowned.  I  had  been 
drowned  a  week  when  a  sea-nymph  came  to 
me  and  informed  me  that  I  was  to  be  one 
of  her  followers  forever  afterwards,  adding 
that  it  should  be  my  doom  to  haunt  Har 
rowby  Hall  for  one  hour  every  Christmas 
Eve  throughout  the  rest  of  eternity.  I  was 


THE    WATER   GHOST  9 

to  haunt  that  room  on  such  Christmas 
Eves  as  I  found  it  inhabited ;  and  if  it 
should  turn  out  not  to  be  inhabited,  I  was 
and  am  to  spend  the  allotted  hour  with  the 
head  of  the  house." 

"  I'll  sell  the  place." 

"That  you  cannot  do,  for  it  is  also  re 
quired  of  me  that  I  shall  appear  as  the 
deeds  are  to  be  delivered  to  any  purchaser, 
and  divulge  to  him  the  awful  secret  of  the 
house." 

"Do  you  mean  to  tell  me  that  on  every 
Christmas  Eve  that  I  don't  happen  to  have 
somebody  in  that  guest  -  chamber,  you  are 
going  to  haunt  me  wherever  I  may  be,  ruin 
ing  my  whiskey,  taking  all  the  curl  out  of  my 
hair,  extinguishing  my  fire,  and  soaking  me 
through  to  the  skin  ?"  demanded  the  master. 

"You  have  stated  the  case,  Oglethorpe. 
And  what  is  more,"  said  the  water  ghost, 
"  it  doesn't  make  the  slightest  difference 
where  you  are,  if  I  find  that  room  empty, 
wherever  you  may  be  I  shall  douse  you  with 
my  spectral  pres — " 

Here  the  clock  struck  one,  and  immedi 
ately  the  apparition  faded  away.  It  was 


10  THE    WATER    GHOST 

perhaps  more  of  a  trickle  than  a  fade,  but 
as  a  disappearance  it  was  complete. 

"  By  St.  George  and  his  Dragon  !"  ejacu 
lated  the  master  of  Harrowby,  wringing  his 
hands.  "  It  is  guineas  to  hot-cross  buns 
that  next  Christmas  there's  an  occupant  of 
the  spare  room,  or  I  spend  the  night  in  a 
bath-tub." 

But  the  master  of  Harrowby  would  have 
lost  his  wager  had  there  been  any  one  there 
to  take  him  up,  for  when  Christmas  Eve 
came  again  he  was  in  his  grave,  never 
having  recovered  from  the  cold  contracted 
that  awful  night.  Harrowby  Hall  was  closed, 
and  the  heir  to  the  estate  was  in  London, 
where  to  him  in  his  chambers  came  the 
same  experience  that  his  father  had  gone 
through,  saving  only  that,  being  younger 
and  stronger,  he  survived  the  shock.  Ev 
erything  in  his  rooms  was  ruined  —  his 
clocks  were  rusted  in  the  works  ;  a  fine  col 
lection  of  water-color  drawings  was  entire 
ly  obliterated  by  the  onslaught  of  the  water 
ghost ;  and  what  was  worse,  the  apartments 
below  his  were  drenched  with  the  water 
soaking  through  the  floors,  a  damage  for 


THE    WATER    GHOST  II 

which  he  was  compelled  to  pa)',  and  which 
resulted  in  his  being  requested  by  his  land 
lady  to  vacate  the  premises  immediately. 

The  story  of  the  visitation  inflicted  upon 
his  family  had  gone  abroad,  and  no  one 
could  be  got  to  invite  him  out  to  any  func 
tion  save  afternoon  teas  and  receptions.  Fa 
thers  of  daughters  declined  to  permit  him 
to  remain  in  their  houses  later  than  eight 
o'clock  at  night,  not  knowing  but  that  some 
emergency  might  arise  in  the  supernatural 
world  which  would  require  the  unexpected 
appearance  of  the  water  ghost  in  this  on 
nights  other  than  Christmas  Eve,  and  be 
fore  the  mystic  hour  when  weary  church 
yards,  ignoring  the  rules  which  are  sup 
posed  to  govern  polite  society,  begin  to 
yawn.  Nor  would  the  maids  themselves 
have  aught  to  do  with  him,  fearing  the  de 
struction  by  the  sudden  incursion  of  aque 
ous  femininity  of  the  costumes  which  they 
held  most  dear. 

So  the  heir  of  Harrowby  Hall  resolved, 
as  his  ancestors  for  several  generations  be 
fore  him  had  resolved,  that  something  must 
be  done.  His  first  thought  was  to  make 


12  THE    WATER   GHOST 

one  of  his  servants  occupy  the  haunted 
room  at  the  crucial  moment ;  but  in  this 
he  failed,  because  the  servants  themselves 
knew  the  history  of  that  room  and  rebelled. 
None  of  his  friends  would  consent  to  sacri 
fice  their  personal  comfort  to  his,  nor  was 
there  to  be  found  in  all  England  a  man  so 
poor  as  to  be  willing  to  occupy  the  doomed 
chamber  on  Christmas  Eve  for  pay. 

Then  the  thought  came  to  the  heir  to 
have  the  fireplace  in  the  room  enlarged,  so 
that  he  might  evaporate  the  ghost  at  its 
first  appearance,  and  he  was  felicitating 
himself  upon  the  ingenuity  of  his  plan,  when 
he  remembered  what  his  father  had  told 
him — how  that  no  fire  could  withstand  the 
lady's  extremely  contagious  dampness.  And 
then  he  bethought  him  of  steam  -  pipes. 
These,  he  remembered,  could  lie  hundreds 
of  feet  deep  in  water,  and  still  retain  suffi 
cient  heat  to  drive  the  water  away  in  vapor; 
and  as  a  result  of  this  thought  the  haunted 
room  was  heated  by  steam  to  a  wither 
ing  degree,  and  the  heir  for  six  months  at 
tended  daily  the  Turkish  baths,  so  that 
when  Christmas  Eve  came  he  could  himself 


THE    WATER    GHOST  13 

withstand  the  awful  temperature  of  the 
room. 

The  scheme  was  only  partially  success 
ful.  The  water  ghost  appeared  at  the  speci 
fied  time,  and  found  the  heir  of  Harrow- 
by  prepared ;  but  hot  as  the  room  was,  it 
shortened  her  visit  by  no  more  than  five 
minutes  in  the  hour,  during  which  time  the 
nervous  system  of  the  young  master  was 
wellnigh  shattered,  and  the  room  itself  was 
cracked  and  warped  to  an  extent  which  re 
quired  the  outlay  of  a  large  sum  of  money 
to  remedy.  And  worse  than  this,  as  the 
last  drop  of  the  water  ghost  was  slowly 
sizzling  itself  out  on  the  floor,  she  whis 
pered  to  her  would-be  conqueror  that  his 
scheme  would  avail  him  nothing,  because 
there  was  still  water  in  great  plenty  where 
she  came  from,  and  that  next  year  would 
find  her  rehabilitated  and  as  exasperatingly 
saturating  as  ever. 

It  was  then  that  the  natural  action  of  the 
mind,  in  going  from  one  extreme  to  the 
other,  suggested  to  the  ingenious  heir  of 
Harrowby  the  means  by  which  the  water 
ghost  was  ultimately  conquered,  and  happi- 


14  THE    WATER   GHOST 

ness  once  more  came  within  the  grasp  of 
the  house  of  Oglethorpe. 

The  heir  provided  himself  with  a  warm 
suit  of  fur  under-clothing.  Donning  this 
with  the  furry  side  in,  he  placed  over  it 
a  rubber  garment,  tightfitting,  which  he 
wore  just  as  a  woman  wears  a  jersey.  On 
top  of  this  he  placed  another  set  of  un 
der-clothing,  this  suit  made  of  wool,  and 
over  this  was  a  second  rubber  garment 
like  the  first.  Upon  his  head  he  placed 
a  light  and  comfortable  diving  helmet, 
and  so  clad,  on  the  following  Christmas 
Eve  he  awaited  the  coming  of  his  tor 
mentor. 

It  was  a  bitterly  cold  night  that  brought 
to  a  close  this  twenty-fourth  day  of  Decem 
ber.  The  air  outside  was  still,  but  the  tem 
perature  was  below  zero.  Within  all  was 
quiet,  the  servants  of  Harrowby  Hall  await 
ing  with  beating  hearts  the  outcome  of  their 
master's  campaign  against  his  supernatural 
visitor. 

The  master  himself  was  lying  on  the  bed 
in  the  haunted  room,  clad  as  has  already 
been  indicated,  and  then — 


THE    WATER    GHOST  15 

The  clock  clanged  out  the  hour  of 
twelve. 

There  was  a  sudden  banging  of  doors,  a 
blast  of  cold  air  swept  through  the  halls, 
the  door  leading  into  the  haunted  chamber 
flew  open,  a  splash  was  heard,  and  the  water 
ghost  was  seen  standing  at  the  side  of  the 
heir  of  Harrowby,  from  whose  outer  dress 
there  streamed  rivulets  of  water,  but  whose 
own  person  deep  down  under  the  various 
garments  he  wore  was  as  dry  and  as  warm 
as  he  could  have  wished. 

"  Ha  !"  said  the  young  master  of  Harrow- 
by.  "  I'm  glad  to  see  you." 

"  You  are  the  most  original  man  I've  met, 
if  that  is  true,"  returned  the  ghost.  "  May 
I  ask  where  did  you  get  that  hat  ?" 

"  Certainly,  madam,"  returned  the  mas 
ter,  courteously.  "  It  is  a  little  portable  ob 
servatory  I  had  made  for  just  such  emergen 
cies  as  this.  But,  tell  me,  is  it  true  that 
you  are  doomed  to  follow  me  about  for  one 
mortal  hour — to  stand  where  I  stand,  to  sit 
where  I  sit?" 

"That  is  my  delectable  fate,"  returned 
the  lady. 


1 6  THE   WATER   GHOST 

"  We'll  go  out  on  the  lake,"  said  the  mas 
ter,  starting  up. 

"  You  can't  get  rid  of  me  that  way,"  re 
turned  the  ghost.  "  The  water  won't  swal 
low  me  up  ;  in  fact,  it  will  just  add  to  my 
present  bulk." 

"  Nevertheless,"  said  the  master,  firmly, 
"  we  will  go  out  on  the  lake." 

"  But,  my  dear  sir,"  returned  the  ghost, 
with  a  pale  reluctance,  "it  is  fearfully  cold 
out  there.  You  will  be  frozen  hard  before 
you've  been  out  ten  minutes." 

"Oh  no,  I'll  not,"  replied  the  master.  "  I 
am  very  warmly  dressed.  Come  !"  This 
last  in  a  tone  of  command  that  made  the 
ghost  ripple. 

And  they  started. 

They  had  not  gone  far  before  the  water 
ghost  showed  signs  of  distress. 

"You  walk  too  slowly,"  she  said.  "  I  am 
nearly  frozen.  My  knees  are  so  stiff  now  I 
can  hardly  move.  I  beseech  you  to  accel 
erate  your  step." 

"  I  should  like  to  oblige  a  lady,"  returned 
the  master,  courteously,  "  but  my  clothes 
are  rather  heavy,  and  a  hundred  yards  an 


THE   WATER   GHOST  If 

hour  is  about  my  speed.  Indeed,  I  think 
we  would  better  sit  down  here  on  this  snow 
drift,  and  talk  matters  over." 

"  Do  not !  Do  not  do  so,  I  beg  !"  cried 
the  ghost.  "  Let  me  move  on.  I  feel  my 
self  growing  rigid  as  it  is.  If  we  stop  here, 
I  shall  be  frozen  stiff." 

"  That,  madam,"  said  the  master  slowly, 
and  seating  himself  on  an  ice-cake — "that 
is  why  I  have  brought  you  here.  We  have 
been  on  this  spot  just  ten  minutes ;  we  have 
fifty  more.  Take  your  time  about  it,  madam, 
but  freeze,  that  is  all  I  ask  of  you." 

"  I  cannot  move  my  right  leg  now,"  cried 
the  ghost,  in  despair,  "  and  my  overskirt  is  a 
solid  sheet  of  ice.  Oh,  good,  kind  Mr.  Ogle- 
thorpe,  light  a  fire,  and  let  me  go  free  from 
these  icy  fetters." 

"  Never,  madam.  It  cannot  be.  I  have 
you  at  last." 

"  Alas !"  cried  the  ghost,  a  tear  trickling 
down  her  frozen  cheek.  "  Help  me,  I  beg. 
I  congeal !" 

"  Congeal,  madam,  congeal !"  returned 
Oglethorpe,  coldly.  "You  have  drenched 
me  and  mine  for  two  hundred  and  three 


l8  THE   WATER   GHOST 

years,  madam.  To-night  you  have  had  your 
last  drench." 

"Ah,  but  I  shall  thaw  out  again,  and 
then  you'll  see.  Instead  of  the  comfortably 
tepid,  genial  ghost  I  have  been  in  my  past, 
sir,  I  shall  be  iced  -  water,"  cried  the  lady, 
threateningly. 

"No,  you  won't,  either,"  returned  Ogle- 
thorpe ;  "  for  when  you  are  frozen  quite  stiff, 
I  shall  send  you  to  a  cold-storage  warehouse, 
and  there  shall  you  remain  an  icy  work  of 
art  forever  more." 

"  But  warehouses  burn." 

"  So  they  do,  but  this  warehouse  cannot 
burn.  It  is  made  of  asbestos  and  surround 
ing  it  are  fire-proof  walls,  and  within  those 
walls  the  temperature  is  now  and  shall  for 
ever  be  416  degrees  below  the  zero  point; 
low  enough  to  make  an  icicle  of  any  flame 
in  this  world — or  the  next,"  the  master  add 
ed,  with  an  ill-suppressed  chuckle. 

"  For  the  last  time  let  me  beseech  you.  I 
would  go  on  my  knees  to  you,  Oglethorpe, 
were  they  not  already  frozen.  I  beg  of 
you  do  not  doo — " 

Here  even  the  words  froze  on  the  water 


THE    WATER    GHOST  19 

ghost's  lips  and  the  clock  struck  one.  There 
was  a  momentary  tremor  throughout  the 
ice-bound  form,  and  the  moon,  coming  out 
from  behind  a  cloud,  shone  down  on  the 
rigid  figure  of  a  beautiful  woman  sculptured 
in  clear,  transparent  ice.  There  stood  the 
ghost  of  Harrowby  Hall,  conquered  by  the 
cold,  a  prisoner  for  all  time. 

The  heir  of  Harrowby  had  won  at  last, 
and  to-day  in  a  large  storage  house  in  Lon 
don  stands  the  frigid  form  of  one  who  will 
never  again  flood  the  house  of  Oglethorpe 
with  woe  and  sea-water. 

As  for  the  heir  of  Harrowby,  his  success 
in  coping  with  a  ghost  has  made  him  fa 
mous,  a  fame  that  still  lingers  about  him, 
although  his  victory  took  place  some  twenty 
years  ago;  and  so  far  from  being  unpopular 
with  the  fair  sex,  as  he  was  when  we  first 
knew  him,  he  has  not  only  been  married 
twice,  but  is  to  lead  a  third  bride  to  the 
altar  before  the  year  is  out. 


THE   SPECTRE  COOK   OF   BAN 
GLETOP 


T 


FOR  the  purposes  of  this  bit  of  history, 
Bangletop  Hall  stands  upon  a  grassy  knoll 
on  the  left  bank  of  the  River  Dee,  about 
eighteen  miles  from  the  quaint  old  city  of 
Chester.  It  does  not  in  reality  stand  there, 
nor  has  it  ever  done  so,  but  consideration 
for  the  interests  of  the  living  compels  me 
to  conceal  its  exact  location,  and  so  to  be 
fog  the  public  as  to  its  whereabouts  that 
its  identity  may  never  be  revealed  to  its 
disadvantage.  It  is  a  rentable  property, 
and  were  it  known  that  it  has  had  a  mys 
tery  connected  with  it  of  so  deep,  dark, 
and  eerie  a  nature  as  that  about  to  be  re 
lated,  I  fear  that  its  usefulness,  save  as  an 
accessory  to  romance,  would  be  seriously 


THE  SPECTRE    COOK    OF    BANGLETOP       21 

impaired,   and    that    as    an    investment   it 
would  become  practically  worthless. 

The  hall  is  a  fair  specimen  of  the  archi 
tecture  which  prevailed  at  the  time  of  Ed 
ward  the  Confessor  ;  that  is  to  say,  the  main 
portion  of  the  structure,  erected  in  Edward's 
time  by  the  first  Baron  Bangletop,  has  that 
square,  substantial,  stony  aspect  which  to 
the  eye  versed  in  architecture  identifies  it  at 
once  as  a  product  of  that  enlightened  era. 
Later  owners,  the  successive  Barons  Bangle- 
top,  have  added  to  its  original  dimensions, 
putting  Queen  Anne  wings  here,  Elizabeth 
an  ells  there,  and  an  Italian  -  Renaissance 
fagade  on  the  river  front.  A  Wisconsin 
water  tower,  connected  with  the  main  build 
ing  by  a  low  Gothic  alleyway,  stands  to  the 
south ;  while  toward  the  east  is  a  Greek 
chapel,  used  by  the  present  occupant  as  a 
store-room  for  his  wife's  trunks,  she  having 
lately  returned  from  Paris  with  a  wardrobe 
calculated  to  last  through  the  first  half  of 
the  coming  London  season.  Altogether 
Bangletop  Hall  is  an  impressive  structure, 
and  at  first  sight  gives  rise  to  various  emo 
tions  in  the  aesthetic  breast ;  some  cavil, 


22       THE   SPECTRE   COOK  OF   BANGLETOP 

others  admire.  One  leading  architect  of 
Berlin  travelled  all  the  way  from  his  Ger 
man  home  to  Bangletop  Hall  to  show  that 
famous  structure  to  his  son,  a  student  in 
the  profession  which  his  father  adorned ;  to 
whom  he  is  said  to  have  observed  that,  ar 
chitecturally,  Bangletop  Hall  was  "cosmo 
politan  and  omniperiodic,  and  therefore  a 
liberal  education  to  all  who  should  come 
to  study  and  master  its  details."  In  short, 
Bangletop  Hall  was  an  object-lesson  to 
young  architects,  and  showed  them  at  a 
glance  that  which  they  should  ever  strive 
to  avoid. 

Strange  to  say,  for  quite  two  centuries  had 
Bangletop  Hall  remained  without  a  tenant, 
and  for  nearly  seventy-five  years  it  had  been 
in  the  market  for  rent,  the  barons,  father 
and  son,  for  many  generations  having  found 
it  impossible  to  dwell  within  its  walls,  and 
for  a  very  good  reason  :  no  cook  could  ever 
be  induced  to  live  at  Bangletop  for  a  longer 
period  than  two  weeks.  Why  the  queens  of 
the  kitchen  invariably  took  what  is  common 
ly  known  as  French  leave  no  occupant  could 
ever  learn,  because,  male  or  female,  the  de- 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP      23 

parted  domestics  never  returned  to  tell,  and 
even  had  they  done  so,  the  pride  of  the  Ban- 
gletops  would  not  have  permitted  them  to 
listen  to  the  explanation.  The  Bangletop 
escutcheon  was  clear  of  blots,  no  suspicion 
even  of  a  conversational  blemish  appearing 
thereon,  and  it  was  always  a  matter  of  ex 
treme  satisfaction  to  the  family  that  no  one 
of  its  scions  since  the  title  was  created  had 
ever  been  known  to  speak  directly  to  any 
one  of  lesser  rank  than  himself,  commu 
nication  with  inferiors  being  always  had 
through  the  medium  of  a  private  secretary, 
himself  a  baron,  or  better,  in  reduced  cir 
cumstances. 

The  first  cook  to  leave  Bangletop  under 
circumstances  of  a  Gallic  nature  —  that  is, 
without  known  cause,  wages,  or  luggage — 
had  been  employed  by  Fitzherbert  Alexan 
der,  seventeenth  Baron  of  Bangletop, through 
Charles  Mortimor  de  Herbert,  Baron  Ped- 
dlington,  formerly  of  Peddlington  Manor  at 
Dun woodie-on-the- Hike,  his  private  secre 
tary,  a  handsome  old  gentleman  of  sixty- 
five,  who  had  been  deprived  of  his  estates 
by  the  crown  in  1629  because  he  was  sus- 


24      THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF  BANGLETOP 

pected  of  having  inspired  a  comic  broadside 
published  in  those  troublous  days,  and  di 
rected  against  Charles  the  First,  which  had 
set  all  London  in  a  roar. 

This  broadside,  one  of  very  few  which  are 
not  preserved  in  the  British  Museum — and 
a  greater. tribute  to  its  rarity  could  not  be 
devised — was  called,  "  A  Good  Suggestion 
as  to  ye  Proper  Use  of  ye  Chinne  Whisker," 
and  consisted  of  a  few  lines  of  doggerel 
printed  beneath  a  caricature  of  the  king, 
with  the  crown  hanging  from  his  goatee, 
reading  as  follows : 

"  Ye  King  doth  sporte  a  gallous  grey  goatee 
Uponne  ye  chinne,   where  every  one  may  see. 
And  since  ye  Monarch's  head's  too  small  to  holde 
With  comfort  to  himself e  ye  croivne  of  gold. 
Why  not  emvax  and  hooke  ye  goatee  rare. 
And  lette  ye   British    crown    hang   down  from 
there?" 

Whether  or  no  the  Baron  of  Peddlington 
was  guilty  of  this  traitorous  effusion  no  one, 
not  even  the  king,  could  ever  really  make 
up  his  mind.  The  charge  was  never  fully 
proven,  nor  was  De  Herbert  ever  able  to 


A   DEPARTING   COOK 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP      27 

refute  it  successfully,  although  he  made 
frantic  efforts  to  do  so.  The  king,  emi 
nently  just  in  such  matters,  gave  the  baron 
the  benefit  of  the  doubt,  and  inflicted  only 
half  the  penalty  prescribed,  confiscating  his 
estates,  and  letting  him  keep  his  head  and 
liberty.  De  Herbert's  family  begged  the 
crown  to  reverse  the  sentence,  permitting 
them  to  keep  the  estates,  the  king  taking 
their  uncle's  head  in  lieu  thereof,  he  being 
unmarried  and  having  no  children  who 
would  mourn  his  loss.  But  Charles  was 
poor  rather  than  vindictive  at  this  period, 
and  preferring  to  adopt  the  other  course, 
turned  a  deaf  ear  to  the  petitioners.  This 
was  probably  one  of  the  earliest  factors  in 
the  decadence  of  literature  as  a  pastime  for 
men  of  high  station. 

De  Herbert  would  have  starved  had  it 
not  been  for  his  old  friend  Baron  Bangle- 
top,  who  offered  him  the  post  of  private 
secretary,  lately  made  vacant  by  the  death 
of  the  Duke  of  Algeria,  who  had  been  the 
incumbent  of  that  office  for  ten  years,  and 
in  a  short  time  the  Baron  of  Peddlington 
was  in  full  charge  of  the  domestic  arrange- 


28       THE    SPECTRE    COOK    OF   BANGLETOP 

ments  of  his  friend.  It  was  far  from  easy, 
the  work  that  devolved  upon  him.  He  was 
a  proud,  haughty  man,  used  to  luxury  of 
every  sort,  to  whom  contact  with  those  who 
serve  was  truly  distasteful ;  to  whom  the 
necessity  of  himself  serving  was  most  gall 
ing;  but  he  had  the  manliness  to  face  the 
hardships  Fate  had  put  upon  him,  particu 
larly  when  he  realized  that  Baron  Bangle- 
top's  attitude  towards  servants  was  such 
that  he  could  with  impunity  impose  on  the 
latter  seven  indignities  for  every  one  that 
was  imposed  on  him.  Misery  loves  com 
pany,  particularly  when  she  is  herself  the 
hostess,  and  can  give  generously  of  her 
stores  to  others. 

Desiring  to  retrieve  his  fallen  fortunes, 
the  Baron  of  Peddlington  offered  large 
salaries  to  those  whom  he  employed  to 
serve  in  the  Bangletop  menage,  and  on  pay 
day,  through  an  ingenious  system  of  fines, 
managed  to  retain  almost  seventy-five  per 
cent,  of  the  funds  for  his  own  use.  Of  this 
Baron  Bangletop,  of  course,  could  know 
nothing.  He  was  aware  that  under  De 
Herbert  the  running  expenses  of  his  house- 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP      2Q 

hold  were  nearly  twice  what  they  had  been 
under  the  dusky  Duke  of  Algeria;  but  he 
also  observed  that  repairs  to  the  property, 
for  which  the  late  duke  had  annually  paid 
out  several  thousands  of  pounds  sterling, 
with  very  little  to  show  for  it,  now  cost  him 
as  many  hundreds  with  no  fewer  tangible 
results.  So  he  winked  his  eye — the  only 
unaristocratic  habit  he  had,  by-the-way — 
and  said  nothing.  The  revenue  was  large 
enough,  he  had  been  known  to  say,  to  sup 
port  himself  and  all  his  relatives  in  state, 
with  enough  left  over  to  satisfy  even  Ali 
Baba  and  the  forty  thieves. 

Had  he  foreseen  the  results  of  his  com 
placency  in  financial  matters,  I  doubt  if  he 
would  have  persisted  therein. 

For  some  ten  years  under  De  Herbert's 
management  everything  went  smoothly  and 
expensively  for  the  Bangletop  Hall  people, 
and  then  there  came  a  change.  The  Baron 
Bangletop  rang  for  his  breakfast  one  morn 
ing,  and  his  breakfast  was  not.  The  cook 
had  disappeared.  Whither  or  why  she  had 
gone,  the  private  secretary  professed  to  be 
unable  to  say.  That  she  could  easily  be 


30      THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP 

replaced,  he  was  certain.  Equally  certain 
was  it  that  Baron  Bangletop  stormed  and 
raved  for  two  hours,  ate  a  cold  breakfast — a 
thing  he  never  had  been  known  to  do  be 
fore — and  then  departed  for  London  to  dine 
at  the  club  until  Peddlington  had  secured  a 
successor  to  the  departed  cook,  which  the 
private  secretary  succeeded  in  doing  within 
three  days.  The  baron  was  informed  of 
his  manager's  success,  and  at  the  end  of  a 
week  returned  to  Bangletop  Hall,  arriving 
there  late  on  a  Saturday  night,  hungry  as  a 
bear,  and  not  too  amiable,  the  king  having 
negotiated  a  forcible  loan  with  him  during 
his  sojourn  in  the  metropolis. 

"Welcome  to  Bangletop,  Baron,"  said  De 
Herbert,  uneasily,  as  his  employer  alighted 
from  his  coach. 

"  Blast  your  welcome,  and  serve  the  din 
ner,"  returned  the  baron,  with  a  somewhat 
ill  grace. 

At  this  the  private  secretary  seemed 
much  embarrassed.  "  Ahem !"  he  said. 
"  I'll  be  very  glad  to  have  the  dinner 
served,  my  dear  Baron ;  but  the  fact  is 
I  —  er  —  I  have  been  unable  to  provide 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK  OF  BANGLETOP      33 

anything  but  canned  lobster  and  ap 
ples." 

"What,  in  the  name  of  Chaucer,  does 
this  mean  ?"  roared  Bangletop,  who  was  a 
great  admirer  of  the  father  of  English  poe 
try  ;  chiefly  because,  as  he  was  wont  to  say, 
Chaucer  showed  that  a  bad  speller  could 
be  a  great  man,  which  was  a  condition  of 
affairs  exactly  suited  to  his  mind,  since  in 
the  science  of  orthography  he  was  weak, 
like  most  of  the  aristocrats  of  his  day.  "  I 
thought  you  sent  me  word  you  had  a  cook  ?" 

"  Yes,  Baron,  I  did ;  but  the  fact  of  the 
matter  is,  sir,  she  left  us  last  night,  or,  rath 
er,  early  this  morning." 

"  Another  one  of  your  beautiful  Parisian 
exits,  I  presume  ?"  sneered  the  baron,  tap 
ping  the  floor  angrily  with  his  toe. 

"Well,  yes,  somewhat  so;  only  she  got 
her  money  first." 

"Money!"  shrieked  the  baron.  "Mon 
ey  !  Why  in  Liverpool  did  she  get  her 
money  ?  What  did  we  owe  her  money  for  ? 
Rent  ?" 

"  No,  Baron  ;  for  services.  She  cooked 
three  dinners." 


34      THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP 

"  Well,  you'll  pay  the  bill  out  of  your  per 
quisites,  that's  all.  She's  done  no  cooking 
for  me,  and  she  gets  no  pay  from  me.  Why 
do  you  think  she  left  ?" 

"  She  said—" 

"  Never  mind  what  she  said,  sir,"  cried 
Bangletop,  cutting  De  Herbert  short. 
"When  I  am  interested  in  the  table-talk  of 
cooks,  I'll  let  you  know.  What  I  wish  to 
hear  is  what  do  you  think  was  the  cause  of 
her  leaving  ?" 

"  I  have  no  opinion  on  the  subject,"  re 
plied  the  private  secretary,  with  becoming 
dignity.  "  I  only  know  that  at  four  o'clock 
this  morning  she  knocked  at  my  door,  and 
demanded  her  wages  for  four  days,  and 
vowed  she'd  stay  no  longer  in  the  house." 

"  And  why,  pray,  did  you  not  inform  me 
of  the  fact,  instead  of  having  me  travel 
away  down  here  from  London  ?"  queried 
Bangletop. 

"You  forget,  Baron,"  replied  De  Her 
bert,  with  a  deprecatory  gesture — "  you  for 
get  that  there  is  no  system  of  telegraphy  by 
which  you  could  be  reached.  I  may  be 
poor,  sir,  but  I'm  just  as  much  of  a  baron 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP      35 

as  you  are,  and  I  will  take  the  liberty  of 
saying  right  here,  in  what  would  be  the 
shadow  of  your  beard,  if  you  had  one,  sir, 
that  a  man  who  insists  on  receiving  cable 
messages  when  no  such  things  exist  is  rath 
er  rushing  business." 

"  Pardon  my  haste,  Peddlington,  old 
chap,"  returned  the  baron,  softening.  "  You 
are  quite  right.  My  desire  was  unreason 
able  ;  but  I  swear  to  you,  by  all  my  ances 
tral  Bangletops,  that  I  am  hungry  as  a  pit 
full  of  bears,  and  if  there's  one  thing  I  can't 
eat,  it  is  lobster  and  apples.  Can't  you 
scare  up  a  snack  of  bread  and  cheese  and 
a  little  cold  larded  fillet  ?  If  you'll  supply 
the  fillet,  I'll  provide  the  cold." 

At  this  sally  the  Baron  of  Peddlington 
laughed  and  the  quarrel  was  over.  But 
none  the  less  the  master  of  Bangletop  went 
to  bed  hungry ;  nor  could  he  do  any  better 
in  the  morning  at  breakfast  -  time.  The 
butler  had  not  been  trained  to  cook,  and 
the  coachman's  art  had  once  been  tried  on 
a  boiled  egg,  which  no  one  had  been  able 
to  open,  much  less  eat,  and  as  it  was  the 
parlor -maid's  Sunday  off,  there  was  abso- 


36      THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF   BANGLETOP 

lutely  no  one  in  the  house  who  could  pre 
pare  a  meal.  The  Baron  of  Bangletop  had 
a  sort  of  sneaking  notion  that  if  there  were 
nobody  around  he  could  have  managed  the 
spit  or  gridiron  himself;  but,  of  course,  in 
view  of  his  position,  he  could  not  make  the 
attempt.  And  so  he  once  more  returned  to 
London,  and  vowed  never  to  set  his  foot 
within  the  walls  of  Bangletop  Hall  again 
until  his  ancestral  home  was  provided  with 
a  cook  "  copper-fastened  and  riveted  to  her 
position." 

And  Bangletop  Hall  from  that  time  was 
as  a  place  deserted.  The  baron  never  re 
turned,  because  he  could  not  return  without 
violating  his  oath ;  for  De  Herbert  was  not 
able  to  obtain  a  cook  for  the  Bangletop 
cuisine  who  would  stay,  nor  was  any  one 
able  to  discover  why.  Cook  after  cook  came, 
stayed  a  day,  a  week,  and  one  or  two  held 
on  for  two  weeks,  but  never  longer.  Their 
course  was  invariably  the  same — they  would 
leave  without  notice ;  nor  could  any  induce 
ment  be  offered  which  would  persuade  them 
to  remain.  The  Baron  of  Peddlington  be 
came,  first  round-shouldered,- then  deaf,  and 


429068 


THE    SPECTRE    COOK    OF    BANGLETOP       39 

then  insane  in  his  search  for  a  permanent 
cook,  landing  finally  in  an  asylum,  where 
he  died,  four  years  after  the  demise  of  his 
employer  in  London,  of  softening  of  the 
brain.  His  last  words  were,  "  Why  did  you 
leave  your  last  place  ?" 

And  so  time  went  on.  Barons  of  Bangle- 
top  were  born,  educated,  and  died.  Dynas 
ties  rose  and  fell,  but  Bangletop  Hall  re 
mained  uninhabited,  although  it  was  not 
until  1799  tnat  tf16  family  gave  up  all  hopes 
of  being  able  to  use  their  ancestral  home. 
Tremendous  alterations,  as  I  have  already 
hinted,  were  made.  The  drainage  was  care 
fully  inspected,  and  a  special  apartment 
connected  with  the  kitchen,  finished  in  hard 
wood,  handsomely  decorated,  and  hung  with 
rich  tapestries,  was  provided  for  the  cook, 
in  the  vain  hope  that  she  might  be  induced 
permanently  to  occupy  her  position.  The 
Queen  Anne  wing  and  Elizabethan  ell  were 
constructed,  the  latter  to  provide  bowling- 
alleys  and  smoking-rooms  for  the  probable 
cousins  of  possible  culinary  queens,  and 
many  there  were  who  accepted  the  office 
with  alacrity,  throwing  it  up  with  still  greater 


4O      THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP 

alacrity  before  the  usual  fortnight  passed. 
Then  the  Bangletops  saw  clearly  that  it  was 
impossible  for  them  to  live  there,  and  mov 
ing  away,  the  house  was  announced  to  be 
"  for  rent,  with  all  modern  improvements, 
conveniently  located,  spacious  grounds,  es 
pecially  adapted  to  the  use  of  those  who  do 
their  own  cooking."  The  last  clause  of  the 
announcement  puzzled  a  great  many  people, 
who  went  to  see  the  mansion  for  no  other 
reason  than  to  ascertain  just  what  the  an 
nouncement  meant,  and  the  line,  which  was 
inserted  in  a  pure  spirit  of  facetious  bravado, 
was  probably  the  cause  of  the  mansion's 
quickly  renting,  as  hardly  a  month  had 
passed  before  it  was  leased  for  one  year  by 
a  retired  London  brewer,  whose  wife's  curi 
osity  had  been  so  excited  by  the  strange 
wording  of  the  advertisement  that  she  trav 
elled  out  to  Bangletop  to  gratify  it,  fell  in 
love  with  the  place,  and  insisted  upon  her 
husband's  taking  it  for  a  season.  The  luck 
of  the  brewer  and  his  wife  was  no  better 
than  that  of  the  Bangletops.  Their  cooks 
— and  they  had  fourteen  during  their  stay 
there — fled  after  an  average  service  of  four 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP      41 

days  apiece,  and  later  the  tenants  them 
selves  were  forced  to  give  up  and  return  to 
London,  where  they  told  their  friends  that 
the  "'all  was  'aunted,"  which  might  have 
filled  the  Bangletops  with  concern  had  they 
heard  of  it.  They  did  not  hear  of  it,  how 
ever,  for  they  and  their  friends  did  not  know 
the  brewer  and  the  brewer's  friends,  and  as 
for  complaining  to  the  Bangletop  agent  in 
the  matter,  the  worthy  beer-maker  thought 
he  would  better  not  do  that,  because  he  had 
hopes  of  being  knighted  some  day,  and  he 
did  not  wish  to  antagonize  so  illustrious  a 
family  as  the  Bangletops  by  running  down 
their  famous  hall — an  antagonism  which 
might  materially  affect  the  chances  of  him 
self  and  his  good  wife  when  they  came  to 
knock  at  the  doors  of  London  society.  The 
lease  was  allowed  to  run  its  course,  the  rent 
was  paid  when  due,  and  at  the  end  of  the 
stipulated  term  Bangletop  Hall  was  once 
more  on  the  lists  as  for  rent. 


42      THE   SPECTRE  COOK   OF  BANGLETOP 


II 


For  fourscore  years  and  ten  did  the  same 
hard  fortune  pursue  the  owners  of  Bangle- 
top.  Additions  to  the  property  were  made 
immediately  upon  request  of  possible  lessees. 
The  Greek  chapel  was  constructed  in  1868 
at  the  mere  suggestion  of  a  Hellenic  prince, 
who  came  to  England  to  write  a  history  of 
the  American  rebellion,  finding  the  informa 
tion  in  back  files  of  British  newspapers  ex 
actly  suited  to  the  purposes  of  picturesque 
narrative,  and  no  more  misleading  than 
most  home-made  history.  Bangletop  was 
retired,  "far  from  the  gadding  crowd,"  as 
the  prince  put  it,  and  therefore  just  the 
place  in  which  a  historian  of  the  romantic 
school  might  produce  his  magnum  opus 
without  disturbance  ;  the  only  objection  be 
ing  that  there  was  no  place  whither  the 
eminently  Christian  sojourner  could  go  to 
worship  according  to  his  faith,  he  being  a 
communicant  in  the  Greek  Church.  This 
defect  Baron  Bangletop  immediately  reme 
died  by  erecting  and  endowing  the  chapel ; 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP       43 

and  his  youngest  son,  having  been  found 
too  delicate  morally  for  the  army,  was  ap 
pointed  to  the  living  and  placed  in  charge 
of  the  chapel,  having  first  embraced  with 
considerable  ardor  the  faith  upon  which 
the  soul  of  the  princely  tenant  was  wont  to 
feed.  All  of  these  improvements — chapel, 
priest,  the  latter's  change  of  faith,  and  all— 
the  Bangletop  agent  put  at  the  exceedingly 
low  sum  of  forty-two  guineas  per  annum 
and  board  for  the  priest ;  an  offer  which 
the  prince  at  once  accepted,  stipulating, 
however,  that  the  lease  should  be  terminable 
at  any  time  he  or  his  landlord  should  see 
fit.  Against  this  the  agent  fought  nobly, 
but  without  avail.  The  prince  had  heard 
rumors  about  the  cooks  of  Bangletop,  and 
he  was  wary.  Finally  the  stipulation  was 
accepted  by  the  baron,  with  what  result  the 
reader  need  hardly  be  told.  The  prince 
stayed  two  weeks,  listened  to  one  sermon 
in  classic  university  Greek  by  the  youthful 
Bangletop,  was  deserted  by  his  cook,  and 
moved  away. 

After  the  departure  of  the  prince  the  es 
tate  was  neglected  for  nearly  twenty- two 


44      THE    SPECTRE   COOK    OF   BANGLETOP 

years,  the  owner  having  made  up  his  mind 
that  the  case  was  hopeless.  At  the  end  of 
that  period  there  came  from  the  United 
States  a  wealthy  shoemaker,  Hankinson  J. 
Terwilliger  by  name,  chief  owner  of  the  Ter- 
williger  Three-dollar  Shoe  Company  (Lim 
ited),  of  Soleton,  Massachusetts,  and  to  him 
was  leased  Bangletop  Hall,  with  all  its  rights 
and  appurtenances,  for  a  term  of  five  years. 
Mr.  Terwilliger  was  the  first  applicant  for 
the  hall  as  a  dwelling  to  whom  the  agent,  at 
the  instance  of  the  baron,  spoke  in  a  spirit 
of  absolute  candor.  The  baron  was  well  on 
in  years,  and  he  did  not  feel  like  getting  into 
trouble  with  a  Yankee,  so  he  said,  at  his 
time  of  life.  The  hall  had  been  a  thorn  in 
his  flesh  all  his  days,  and  he  didn't  care  if 
it  was  never  occupied,  and  therefore  he 
wished  nothing  concealed  from  a  prospec 
tive  tenant.  It  was  the  agent's  candor  more 
than  anything  else  that  induced  Mr.  Terwil 
liger  to  close  with  him  for  the  term  of  five 
years.  He  suspected  that  the  Bangletops 
did  not  want  him  for  a  tenant,  and  from  the 
moment  that  notion  entered  his  head,  he 
was  resolved  that  he  would  be  a  tenant. 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF   BANGLETOP       45 

"  I'm  as  good  a  man  as  any  baron  that 
ever  lived,"  he  said ;  "  and  if  it  pleases 
Hankinson  J.  Terwilliger  to  live  in  a  baro 
nial  hall,  a  baronial  hall  is  where  Hankinson 
J.  Terwilliger  puts  up." 

"  We  certainly  have  none  of  the  feeling 
which  your  words  seem  to  attribute  to  us, 
my  dear  sir,"  the  agent  had  answered. 
"  Baron  Bangletop  would  feel  highly  hon 
ored  to  have  so  distinguished  a  sojourner  in 
England  as  yourself  occupy  his  estate,  but 
he  does  not  wish  you  to  take  it  without  fully 
understanding  the  circumstances.  Desira 
ble  as  Bangletop  Hall  is,  it  seems  fated  to 
be  unoccupied  because  it  is  thought  to  be 
haunted,  or  something  of  that  sort,  the  effect 
of  which  is  to  drive  away  cooks,  and  without 
cooks  life  is  hardly  an  ideal." 

Mr.  Terwilliger  laughed.  "  Ghosts  and 
me  are  not  afraid  of  each  other,"  he  said. 
"  '  Let  'em  haunt,'  I  say  ;  and  as  for  cooks, 
Mrs.  H.  J.  T.  hasn't  had  a  liberal  education 
for  nothing.  We  could  live  if  all  the  cooks 
in  creation  were  to  go  off  in  a  whiff.  We 
have  daughters  too,  we  have.  Good  smart 
American  girls,  who  can  adorn  a  palace  or 


46      THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF   BANGLETOP 

grace  a  hut  on  demand,  not  afraid  of  pov 
erty,  and  able  to  take  care  of  good  round 
dollars.  They  can  play  the  piano  all  the 
morning  and  cook  dinner  all  the  afternoon 
if  they're  called  on  to  do  it ;  so  your  difficul 
ties  ain't  my  difficulties.  I'll  take  the  hall  at 
your  figures ;  term,  five  years ;  and  if  the 
baron  '11  come  down  and  spend  a  month 
with  us  at  any  time,  I  don't  care  when,  we'll 
show  him  what  a  big  lap  Luxury  can  get  up 
when  she  tries." 

And  so  it  happened.  The  New  York 
papers  announced  that  Hankinson  J.  Ter- 
williger,  Mrs.  Terwilliger,  the  Misses  Ter- 
williger,  and  Master  Hankinson  J.  Terwil 
liger,  Jun.,  of  Soleton,  Massachusetts,  had 
plunged  into  the  dizzy  whirl  of  English  so 
ciety,  and  that  the  sole  of  the  three-dollar 
shoe  now  trod  the  baronial  halls  of  the  Ban- 
gletops.  Later  it  was  announced  that  the 
Misses  Terwilliger,  of  Bangletop  Hall,  had 
been  presented  to  the  queen  ;  that  the  Ter- 
willigers  had  entertained  the  Prince  of  Wales 
at  Bangletop ;  in  fact,  the  Terwilligers  be 
came  an  important  factor  in  the  letters  of 
all  foreign  correspondents  of  American  pa- 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF  BANGLETOP       47 

pers,  for  the  president  of  the  Terwilliger 
Three -dollar  Shoe  Company,  of  Soleton, 
Massachusetts  (Limited),  was  now  in  full 
possession  of  the  historic  mansion,  and  was 
living  up  to  his  surroundings. 

For  a  time  everything  was  plain  sailing 
for  the  Americans  at  Bangletop.  The  dire 
forebodings  of  the  agent  did  not  seem  to  be 
fulfilled,  and  Mr.  Terwilliger  was  beginning 
to  feel  aggrieved.  He  had  hired  a  house 
with  a  ghost,  and  he  wanted  the  use  of  it ; 
but  when  he  reflected  upon  the  consequences 
below  stairs,  he  held  his  peace.  He  was  not 
so  sure,  after  he  had  stayed  at  Bangletop 
awhile,  and  had  had  his  daughters  presented 
to  the  queen,  that  he  could  be  so  indepen 
dent  of  cooks  as  he  had  at  first  supposed. 
Several  times  he  had  hinted  rather  broadly 
that  some  of  the  old  New  England  home 
made  flap-jacks  would  be  most  pleasing  to 
his  palate ;  but  since  the  prince  had  spent 
an  afternoon  on  the  lawn  of  Bangletop,  the 
young  ladies  seemed  deeply  pained  at  the 
mere  mention  of  their  accomplishments  in 
the  line  of  griddles  and  batter;  nor  could 
Mrs.  Terwilliger,  after  having  tasted  the 


48      THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF   BANGLETOP 

joys  of  aristocratic  life,  bring  herself  to  don 
the  apron  which  so  became  her  portly  per 
son  in  the  early  American  days,  and  prepare 
for  her  lord  and  master  one  of  those  de 
licious  platters  of  poached  eggs  and  break 
fast  bacon,  the  mere  memory  of  which  made 
his  mouth  water.  In  short,  palatial  sur 
roundings  had  too  obviously  destroyed  in 
his  wife  and  daughters  all  that  capacity  for 
happiness  in  a  hovel  of  which  Mr.  Terwil- 
liger  had  been  so  proud,  and  concerning 
which  he  had  so  eloquently  spoken  to  Baron 
Bangletop's  agent,  and  he  now  found  him 
self  in  the  position  of  Damocles.  The  hall 
was  leased  for  a  term,  entertainment  had 
been  provided  for  the  county  with  lavish 
hand ;  but  success  was  dependent  entirely 
upon  his  ability  to  keep  a  cook,  his  family 
having  departed  from  their  republican  prin 
ciples,  and  the  history  of  the  house  was 
dead  against  a  successful  issue.  So  he  de 
cided  that,  after  all,  it  was  better  that  the 
ghost  should  be  allowed  to  remain  quies 
cent,  and  he  uttered  no  word  of  complaint. 
It  was  just  as  well,  too,  that  Mr.  Terwil- 
liger  held  his  peace,  and  refrained  from  ad- 


THE    SPECTRE    COOK    OF    BANGLETOP      49 

dressing  a  complaining  missive  to  the  agent 
of  Bangletop  Hall ;  for  before  a  message  of 
that  nature  could  have  reached  the  person 
addressed,  its  contents  would  have  been 
misleading,  for  at  a  quarter  after  midnight 
on  the  morning  of  the  date  set  for  the  first 
of  a  series  of  grand  banquets  to  the  county 
folk,  there  came  from  the  kitchen  of  Bangle- 
top  Hall  a  quick  succession  of  shrieks  that 
sent  the  three  Misses  Terwilliger  into  hys 
terics,  and  caused  Hankinson  J.  Terwilli- 
ger's  sole  remaining  lock  to  stand  erect. 
Mrs.  Terwilliger  did  not  hear  the  shrieks, 
owing  to  a  lately  acquired  habit  of  hear 
ing  nothing  that  proceeded  from  below 
stairs. 

The  first  impulse  of  Terwilliger/^  was 
to  dive  down  under  the  bedclothes,  and  en 
deavor  to  drown  the  fearful  sound  by  his 
own  labored  breathing,  but  he  never  yield 
ed  to  first  impulses.  So  he  awaited  the 
second,  which  came  simultaneously  with  a 
second  series  of  shrieks  and  a  cry  for  help 
in  the  unmistakable  voice  of  the  cook ;  a 
lady,  by-the-way,  who  had  followed  the  Ter 
williger  fortunes  ever  since  the  Terwilligers 


50      THE   SPECTRE    COOK    OF   BANGLETOP 

began  to  have  fortunes,  and  whose  first  ca 
pacity  in  the  family  had  been  the  dual  one 
of  mistress  of  the  kitchen  and  confidante  of 
madame.  The  second  impulse  was  to  arise 
in  his  might,  put  on  a  stout  pair  of  the  Ter- 
williger  three-dollar  brogans — the  strongest 
shoe  made,  having  been  especially  devised 
for  the  British  Infantry  in  the  Soudan — and 
garments  suitable  to  the  occasion,  namely,  a 
mackintosh  and  pair  of  broadcloth  trousers, 
and  go  to  the  rescue  of  the  distressed  do 
mestic.  This  Hankinson  J.  Terwilliger  at 
once  proceeded  to  do,  arming  himself  with 
a  pair  of  horse -pistols,  murmuring  on  the 
way  below  a  soft  prayer,  the  only  one  he 
knew,  and  which,  with  singular  inappropri- 
ateness  on  this  occasion,  began  with  the 
words,  "Now  I  lay  me  down  to  sleep." 

"  What's  the  matter,  Judson  ?"  queried 
Mrs.  Terwilliger,  drowsily,  as  she  opened 
her  eyes  and  saw  her  husband  preparing  for 
the  fray. 

She  no  longer  called  him  Hankinson,  not 
because  she  did  not  think  it  a  good  name, 
nor  was  it  less  euphonious  to  her  ear  than 
Judson,  but  Judson  was  Mr.  Terwilliger's 


TERWILLIGER   TO   THE   RESCUE 


THE  SPECTRE  COOK  OF  BANGLETOP   53 

middle  name,  and  middle  names  were  quite 
the  thing,  she  had  observed,  in  the  best  cir 
cles.  It  was  doubtless  due  to  this  discovery 
that  her  visiting  cards  had  been  engraved 
to  read  "  Mrs.  H.  Judson-Terwilliger,"  the 
hyphen  presumably  being  a  typographical 
error,  for  which  the  engraver  was  responsi 
ble. 

"  Matter  enough,"  growled  Hankinson.  "  I 
have  reason  to  believe  that  that  jackass  of 
a  ghost  is  on  duty  to-night." 

At  the  word  ghost  a  pseudo- aristocratic 
shriek  pervaded  the  atmosphere,  and  Mrs. 
Terwilliger,  forgetting  her  social  position 
for  a  moment,  groaned  "  Oh,  Hank  !"  and 
swooned  away.  And  then  the  president  of 
the  Terwilliger  Three-dollar  Shoe  Company 
of  Soleton,  Massachusetts  (Limited),  de 
scended  to  the  kitchen. 

Across  the  sill  of  the  kitchen  door  lay  the 
culinary  treasure  whose  lobster  croquettes 
the  Prince  of  Wales  had  likened  unto  a 
dream  of  Lucullus.  Within  the  kitchen 
were  signs  of  disorder.  Chairs  were  upset ; 
the  table  was  lying  flat  on  its  back,  with  its 
four  legs  held  rigidly  up  in  the  air ;  the 


54      THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF  BANGLETOP 

kitchen  library,  consisting  of  a  copy  of  Marie 
Antoinette's  Dream- B ook ;  a  yellow- covered 
novel  bearing  the  title  Little  Lucy  ;  or,  The 
Kitchen-maid  who  Became  a  Marchioness;  and 
Sixty  Soups,  by  One  who  Knows,  lay  strewn 
about  the  room,  the  Dream-Book  sadly  torn, 
and  Little  Lucy  disfigured  forever  with  bat 
ter.  Even  to  the  unpractised  eye  it  was 
evident  that  something  had  happened,  and 
Mr.  Terwilliger  felt  a  cold  chill  mounting 
his  spine  three  sections  at  a  time.  Whether 
it  was  the  chill  or  his  concern  for  the  pros 
trate  cook  that  was  responsible  or  not  I 
cannot  say,  but  for  some  cause  or  other  Mr. 
Terwilliger  immediately  got  down  on  his 
knees,  in  which  position  he  gazed  fearfully 
about  him  for  a  few  minutes,  and  then  timid 
ly  remarked,  "  Cook !" 

There  was  no  answer. 

"  Mary,  I  say.  Cook,"  he  whispered, 
"what  the  deuce  is  the  meaning  of  all  this?" 

A  low  moan  was  all  that  came  from  the 
cook,  nor  would  Hankinson  have  listened 
to  more  had  there  been  more  to  hear,  for 
simultaneously  with  the  moan  he  became 
uncomfortably  conscious  of  a  presence.  In 


THE   SPECTRE    COOK   OF  BANGLETOP 


57 


trying  to  describe  it  afterwards,  Hankinson 
said  that  at  first  he  thought  a  cold  draught 
from  a  dank  cavern  filled  with  a  million 
eels,  and  a  rattlesnake  or  two  thrown  in  for 
luck,  was  blowing  over  him,  and  he  avowed 
that  it  was  anything  but  pleasant ;  and  then 
it  seemed  to  change  into  a  mist  drawn 
largely  from  a  stagnant  pool  in  a  malarial 
country,  floating  through  which  were  great 
quantities  of  finely  chopped  sea-weed,  wet 
hair,  and  an  indescribable  atmosphere  of 
something  the  chief  quality  of  which  was  a 
sort  of  stale  clamminess  that  was  awful  in 
its  intensity. 

"  I'm  glad,"  Mr.  Terwilliger  murmured  to 
himself,  "that  I  ain't  one  of  those  delicately 
reared  nobles.  If  I  had  anything  less  than 
a  right-down  regular  republican  constitution 
I'd  die  of  fright." 

And  then  his  natural  grit  came  to  his 
rescue,  and  it  was  well  it  did,  for  the  pres 
ence  had  assumed  shape,  and  now  sat  on 
the  window-ledge  in  the  form  of  a  hag,  glar 
ing  at  him  from  out  of  the  depths  of  her 
unfathomable  eyes,  in  which,  despite  their 
deadly  greenness,  there  lurked  a  tinge  of  red 


58      THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP 

caused  by  small  specks  of  that  hue  semi- 
occasionally  seen  floating  across  her  dilated 
pupils. 

"  You  are  the  Bangletop  ghost,  I  pre 
sume  ?"  said  Terwilliger,  rising  and  stand 
ing  near  the  fire  to  thaw  out  his  system. 

The  spectre  made  no  reply,  but  pointed 
to  the  door. 

"  Yes,"  Terwilliger  said,  as  if  answering 
a  question.  "  That's  the  way  out,  madame. 
It's  a  beautiful  exit,  too.  Just  try  it." 

"  H'l  knows  the  wi  out,"  returned  the 
spectre,  rising  and  approaching  the  tenant 
of  Bangletop,  whose  solitary  lock  also  rose, 
being  too  polite  to  remain  seated  while  the 
ghost  walked.  "  H'l  also  knows  the  wi 
in,  'Ankinson  Judson  Terwilliger." 

"That's  very  evident,  madame,  and  be 
tween  you  and  me  I  wish  you  didn't,"  re 
turned  Hankinson,  somewhat  relieved  to 
hear  the  ghost  talk,  even  if  her  voice  did 
sound  like  the  roar  of  a  conch-shell  with  a 
bad  case  of  grip.  "  I  may  say  to  you  that, 
aside  from  a  certain  uncanny  satisfaction 
which  I  feel  at  being  permitted  for  the  first 
time  in  my  life  to  gaze  upon  the  linaments 


THE   PRESENCE   HAD   ASSUMED   SHAPE 


THE    SPECTRE   COOK    OF   BANGLETOP      6 1 

of  a  real  live  misty  musty  spook,  I  regard 
your  coming  here  as  an  invasion  of  the 
sacred  rights  of  privacy  which  is,  as  you 
might  say,  '  hinexcusable.'  " 

"  Hinvaision  ?"  retorted  the  ghost,  snap 
ping  her  fingers  in  his  face  with  such  effect 
that  his  chin  dropped  until  Terwilliger  be 
gan  to  fear  it  might  never  resume  its  normal 
position.  "  Hinvaision  ?  HTd  like  to  know 
'oo's  the  hinvaider.  H'l've  occupied  hese 
'ere  'alls  for  hover  two  'unclred  years." 

"Then  it's  time  you  moved,  unless  per 
chance  you  are  the  ghost  of  a  mediaeval 
porker,"  Hankinson  said,  his  calmness  re 
turning  now  that  he  had  succeeded  in  plas 
tering  his  iron-gray  lock  across  the  top  of 
his  otherwise  bald  head.  "Of  course,  if  you 
are  a  spook  of  that  kind  you  want  the  earth, 
and  maybe  you'll  get  it." 

"  HTm  no  porker,"  returned  the  spectre. 
"  HTm  simply  the  shide  of  a  poor  abused 
cook  which  is  hafter  revenge." 

"Ah!"  ejaculated  Terwilliger,  raising  his 
eyebrows,  "this  is  getting  interesting.  You're 
a  spook  with  a  grievance,  eh?  Against  me? 
I've  never  wronged  a  ghost  that  I  know  of." 


62      THE    SPECTRE    COOK    OF   BANGLETOP 

"  No,  h'l've  no  'ard  feelinks  against  you, 
sir,"  answered  the  ghost.  "  Hin  fact  h'l 
don't  know  nothink  about  you.  My  trou 
ble's  with  them  Baingletops,  and  h'l'm  a- 
pursuin'  of  'em.  H'l've  cut  'em  out  of 
two  'undred  years  of  rent  'ere.  They  might 
better  'ave  pide  me  me  waiges  hin  full." 

"Oho!"  cried  Terwilliger;  "it's  a  ques 
tion  of  wages,  is  it  ?  The  Bangletops  were 
hard  up  ?" 

" '  Ard  up  ?  The  Baingletops  ?"  laughed 
the  ghost.  "  When  they  gets  'ard  up  the 
Baink  o'  Hengland  will  be  in  all  the  sixty 
soups  mentioned  in  that  there  book." 

"  You  seem  to  be  up  in  the  vernacular," 
returned  Terwilliger,  with  a  smile.  "  I'll 
bet  you  are  an  old  fraud  of  a  modern 
ghost." 

Here  he  discharged  all  six  chambers  of 
his  pistol  into  the  body  of  the  spectre. 

"No  taikers,"  retorted  the  ghost,  as  the 
bullets  whistled  through  her  chest,  and 
struck  deep  into  the  wall  on  the  other  side 
of  the  kitchen.  "That's  a  noisy  gun  you've 
got,  but  you  carn't  ly  a  ghost  with  co'd  lead 
hany  more  than  you  can  ly  a  corner-stone 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF  BANGLETOP      65 

with  a  chicken.  H'I'm  'ere  to  sty  until  I 
gets  me  waiges." 

"What  was  the  amount  of  your  wages 
due  at  the  time  of  your  discharge  ?"  asked 
Hankinson. 

"  H'l  was  gettin'  ten  pounds  a  month," 
returned  the  spectre. 

"  Geewhittaker  !"  cried  Terwilliger,  "you 
must  have  been  an  all-fired  fine  cook." 

"  H'l  was,"  assented  the  ghost,  with  a 
proud  smile.  "  H'l  cooked  a  boar's  'ead 
for  'is  Royal  'Ighness  King  Charles  when 
'e  visited  Baingletop  'All  as  which  was  the 
finest  'e  hever  taisted,  so  'e  said,  hand  'e'd 
'ave  knighted  me  hon  the  spot  honly  me 
sex  wasn't  suited  to  the  title.  'You  carn't 
make  a  knight  out  of  a  woman,'  says  the 
king,  '  but  give  'er  my  compliments,  and  tell 
'er  'er  monarch  says  as  'ow  she's  a  cook  as 
is  too  good  for  'er  staition.' " 

"That  was  very  nice,"  said  Terwilliger. 
"  No  one  could  have  desired  a  higher  rec 
ommendation  than  that." 

"  My  words  hexackly  when  the  baron's 
privit  secretary  told  me  two  dys  laiter  as 
'ow  the  baron's  heggs  wasn't  done  proper," 

5 


66      THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF  BANGLETOP 

said  the  ghost.  "  H'l  says  to  'im,  says  I  : 
'  The  baron's  heggs  be  blowed.  My  mon 
arch's  hopinion  is  worth  two  of  any  ten 
barons's  livin',  and  Mister  Baingletop,'  (h'l 
allus  called  'im  mister  when  'e  was  ugly,)  '  can 
get  'is  heggs  cooked  helsewhere  if  'e  don't 
like  the  wy  h'l  boils  'em.'  Hand  what  do 
you  suppose  the  secretary  said  then  ?" 

"  I  give  it  up,"  replied  Terwilliger. 
"  What  ?" 

"  'E  said  as  'ow  h'l  'ad  the  big  'ead." 

"  How  disgusting  of  him  !"  murmured 
Terwilliger.  "  That  was  simply  low." 

"Hand  then  'e  accuged  me  of  bein'  him- 
pudent." 

"No!" 

"  'E  did,  hindeed ;  hand  then  'e  dis 
charged  me  without  me  waiges.  Hof  course 
h'l  wouldn't  sty  after  that ;  but  h'l  says  to 
'im,  '  Hif  I  don't  get  me  py,  h'Fll  'aunt 
this  place  from  the  dy  of  me  death ;'  hand 
'e  says,  '  'Aunt  awy.' " 

"  And  you  have  kept  your  word." 

"  H'l  'ave  that !  H'I've  made  it  'ot  for 
'em,  too." 

"Well,  now,  look  here,"  said  Terwilliger, 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP      67 

"I'll  tell  you  what  I'll  do.  I'll  pay  you 
your  wages  if  you'll  go  back  to  Spookland 
and  mind  your  own  business.  Ten  pounds 
isn't  much  when  three-dollar  shoes  cost  fif 
teen  cents  a  pair  and  sell  like  hot  waffles. 
Is  it  a  bargain  ?" 

"  H'l  was  sent  off  with  three  months' 
money  owin'  me,"  said  the  ghost. 

"Well,  call  it  thirty  pounds,  then,"  replied 
Terwilliger. 

"  With  hinterest  —  compound  hinterest 
at  six  per  cent. — for  two  'undred  and  thirty 
years,"  said  the  ghost. 

"Phew!"  whistled  Terwilliger.  "Have 
you  any  idea  how  much  money  that  is  ?" 

"Certingly,"  replied  the  ghost.  "Hit's 
just  63,609,609  pounds  6  shillings  4^  pence. 
When  h'l  gets  that,  h'l  flies ;  huntil  I  gets 
it  h'l  stys  'ere  an'  I  'aunts." 

"  Say,"  said  Terwilliger,  "  haven't  you 
been  chumming  with  an  Italian  ghost  named 
Shylock  over  on  the  other  shore  ?" 

"  Shylock  !"  said  the  ghost.  "  No,  h'l've 
never  'card  the  naime.  Perhaps  'e's  stop- 
pin'  at  the  hother  place." 

"  Very  likely,"  said  Terwilliger.     "  He  is 


68      THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF  BANGLETOP 

an  eminent  saint  alongside  of  you.  But  I 
say  now,  Mrs.  Spook,  or  whatever  your 
name  is,  this  is  rubbing  it  in,  to  try  to  col 
lect  as  much  money  as  that,  particularly 
from  me,  who  wasn't  to  blame  in  any  way, 
and  on  whom  you  haven't  the  spook  of  a 
claim." 

"  H'I'm  very  sorry  for  you,  Mr.  Terwilli- 
ger,"  said  the  ghost.  "  But  my  vow  must 
be  kept  sacrid." 

"  But  why  don't  you  come  down  on  the 
Bangletops  up  in  London,  and  squeeze  it 
out  of  them  ?" 

"  H'l  carn't.  H'I'm  bound  to  'aunt  this 
'all,  an'  that's  hall  there  is  about  it.  H'l 
carn't  find  a  better  wy  to  ly  them  Baingle- 
tops  low  than  by  attachin'  of  their  hincome, 
hand  the  rent  of  this  'all  is  the  honly  bit  of 
hincome  within  my  reach." 

"  But  I've  leased  the  place  for  five  years," 
said  Terwilliger,  in  despair  ;  "  and  I've  paid 
the  rent  in  advance." 

"  Carn't  'elp  it,"  returned  the  ghost.  "  Hif 
you  did  that,  hit's  your  own  fault." 

"  I  wouldn't  have  done  it,  except  to  ad 
vertise  my  shoe  business,"  said  Terwilliger, 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF  BANGLETOP      69 

ruefully.  "  The  items  in  the  papers  at  home 
that  arise  from  my  occupancy  of  this  house, 
together  with  the  social  cinch  it  gives  me, 
are  worth  the  money;  but  I'm  hanged  if  it's 
worth  my  while  to  pay  back  salaries  to  ev 
ery  grasping  apparition  that  chooses  to  rise 
up  out  of  the  moat  and  dip  his  or  her  clam 
my  hand  into  my  surplus.  The  shoe  trade 
is  a  blooming  big  thing,  but  the  profits  aren't 
big  enough  to  divide  with  tramp  ghosts." 

"  Your  tone  is  very  'aughty,  'Ankinson  J. 
Terwilliger,  but  it  don't  haffeck  me.  H'l 
don't  care  'oo  pys  the  money,  an'  h'l 
'aven't  got  you  into  this  scripe.  You've 
done  that  yourself.  Hon  the  other  'and, 
sir,  h'l've  showed  you  'ow  to  get  out  of  it." 

"  Well,  perhaps  you're  right,"  returned 
Hankinson.  "  I  can't  say  I  blame  you  for 
not  perjuring  yourself,  particularly  since 
you've  been  dead  long  enough  to  have  dis 
covered  what  the  probable  consequences 
would  be.  But  I  do  wish  there  was  some 
other  way  out  of  it.  /couldn't  pay  you  all 
that  money  without  losing  a  controlling  in 
terest  in  the  shoe  company,  and  that's  hard 
ly  worth  my  while,  now  is  it  ?" 


70      THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF  BANGLETOP 

"  No,  Mr.  Terwilliger ;  hit  is  not." 

"  I  have  a  scheme,"  said  Hankinson,  after 
a  moment  or  two  of  deep  thought.  "  Why 
don't  you  go  back  to  the  spirit  world  and 
expose  the  Bangletops  there  ?  They  have 
spooks,  haven't  they?" 

"  Yes,"  replied  the  ghost,  sadly.  "  But 
the  spirit  world  his  as  bad  as  this  'ere.  The 
spook  of  a  cook  carn't  reach  the  spook  of  a 
baron  there  hany  more  than  a  scullery-maid 
can  reach  a  markis  'ere.  H'l  tried  that 
when  the  baron  died  and  came  over  to  the 
hother  world,  but  'e  'ad  'is  spook  flunkies  on 
'and  to  tell  me  'e  was  hout  drivin'  with  the 
ghost  of  William  the  Conqueror  and  the 
shide  of  Solomon.  H'l  knew  'e  wasn't,  but 
what  could  h'l  do  ?" 

"  It  was  a  mean  game  of  bluff,"  said  Ter 
williger.  "I  suppose,  though,  if  you  were 
the  shade  of  a  duchess,  you  could  simply 
knock  Bangletop  silly  ?" 

"  Yes,  and  the  Baron  of  Peddlington  too. 
'E  was  the  private  secretary  as  said  h'l  'ad 
the  big  'ead." 

"  H'm  !"  said  Terwilliger,  meditatively. 
"  Would  you — er — would  you  consent  to  re- 


THE    SPECTRE    COOK    OF   BANGLETOP       Jl 

tire  from  this  haunting  business  of  yours, 
and  give  me  a  receipt  for  that  bill  for  wages, 
interest  and  all,  if  I  had  you  made  over  into 
the  spook  of  a  duchess  ?  Revenge  is  sweet, 
you  know,  and  there  are  some  revenges  that 
are  simply  a  thousand  times  more  balmy 
than  riches." 

"Would  h'l  ?"  ejaculated  the  ghost,  rising 
and  looking  at  the  clock.  "Would  h'l?" 
she  repeated.  "  Well,  rather.  If  h'l  could 
enter  spook  society  as  a  duchess,  you  can 
wager  a  year's  hincome  them  Bangletops 
wouldn't  be  hin  it." 

"Good!  I  am  glad  to  see  that  you  are 
a  spook  of  spirit.  If  you  had  veins,  I  be 
lieve  there  'd  be  sporting  blood  in  them." 

"  Thainks,"  said  the  ghost,  dryly.  "  But 
'ow  can  it  hever  be  did  ?" 

"  Leave  that  to  me,"  Terwilliger  answered. 
"We'll  call  a  truce  for  two  weeks,  at  the 
end  of  which  time  you  must  come  back 
here,  and  we'll  settle  on  the  final  arrange 
ments.  Keep  your  own  counsel  in  the  mat 
ter,  and  don't  breathe  a  word  about  your 
intentions  to  anybody.  Above  all,  keep 
sober." 


72      THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF   BANGLETOP 

"HTm  no  cannibal,"  retorted  the  ghost. 

"  Who  said  you  were  ?"  asked  Terwilliger. 

"  You  intimated  as  much,"  said  the  ghost, 
with  a  smile.  "You  said  as  'ow  I  must 
keep  sober,  and  'ow  could  I  do  hother- 
wise  hunless  I  swallered  some  spirits  ?" 

Terwilliger  laughed.  He  thought  it  was 
a  pretty  good  joke  for  a  ghost — especially 
a  cook's  ghost — and  then,  having  agreed  on 
the  hour  of  midnight  one  fortnight  thence 
for  the  next  meeting,  they  shook  hands  and 
parted. 

"  What  was  it,  Hankinson  ?"  asked  Mrs. 
Terwilliger,  as  her  husband  crawled  back 
into  bed.  "  Burglars  ?" 

"  Not  a  burglar,"  returned  Hankinson. 
"  Nothing  but  a  ghost — a  poor,  old,  female 
ghost." 

"  Ghost !"  cried  Mrs.  Terwilliger,  trem 
bling  with  fright.  "  In  this  house  ?" 

"  Yes,  my  dear.  Haunted  us  by  mistake, 
that's  all.  Belongs  to  another  place  entire 
ly?  g°t  a  little  befogged,  and  came  here 
without  intending  to,  that's  all.  When  she 
found  out  her  mistake,  she  apologized,  and 
left." 


THEY  SHOOK  HANDS  AND  PARTED 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP      75 

"  What  did  she  have  on  ?"  asked  Mrs. 
Terwilliger,  with  a  sigh  of  relief. 

But  the  president  of  the  Three  -  dollar 
Shoe  Company,  of  Soleton,  Massachusetts 
(Limited),  said  nothing.  He  had  dropped 
off  into  a  profound  slumber. 


Ill 


For  the  next  two  weeks  Terwilliger  lived 
in  a  state  of  preoccupation  that  worried  his 
wife  and  daughters  to  a  very  considerable 
extent.  They  were  afraid  that  something 
had  happened,  or  was  about  to  happen,  in 
connection  with  the  shoe  corporation  ;  and 
this  deprived  them  of  sleep,  particularly  the 
elder  Miss  Terwilliger,  who  had  danced 
four  times  at  a  recent  ball  with  an  impecu 
nious  young  earl,  whom  she  suspected  of 
having  intentions.  Ariadne  was  in  a  state 
of  grave  apprehension,  because  she  knew 
that  much  as  the  earl  might  love  her,  it 
would  be  difficult  for  them  to  marry  on  his 
income,  which  was  literally  too  small  to 


76       THE    SPECTRE   COOK   OF  BANGLETOP 

keep  the  roof  over  his  head  in  decent  re 
pair. 

But  it  was  not  business  troubles  that  oc 
cupied  every  sleeping  and  waking  thought 
of  Hankinson  Judson  Terwilliger.  His 
mind  was  now  set  upon  the  hardest  problem 
it  had  ever  had  to  cope  with,  that  problem 
being  how  to  so  ennoble  the  spectre  cook 
of  Bangletop  that  she  might  outrank  the 
ancestors  of  his  landlord  in  the  other  world 
— the  shady  world,  he  called  it.  The  living 
cook  had  been  induced  to  remain  partly  by 
threats  and  partly  by  promises  of  increased 
pay ;  the  threats  consisting  largely  of  ex 
pressions  of  determination  to  leave  her  in 
England,  thousands  of  miles  from  her  home 
in  Massachusetts,  deserted  and  forlorn,  the 
poor  woman  being  insufficiently  provided 
with  funds  to  get  back  to  America,  and 
holding  in  her  veins  a  strain  of  Celtic  blood 
quite  large  enough  to  make  the  idea  of  re 
maining  an  outcast  in  England  absolutely 
intolerable  to  her.  At  the  end  of  seven 
days  Terwilliger  was  seemingly  as  far  from 
the  solution  of  his  problem  as  ever,  and  at 
the  grand  fete  given  by  himself  and  wife  on 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF  BANGLETOP       77 

the  afternoon  of  the  seventh  day  of  his 
trial,  to  the  Earl  of  Mugley,  the  one  in 
whom  Ariadne  was  interested,  he  seemed 
almost  rude  to  his  guests,  which  the  latter 
overlooked,  taking  it  for  the  American  way 
of  entertaining.  It  is  very  hard  for  a  shoe 
maker  to  entertain  earls,  dukes,  and  the 
plainest  kind  of  every-day  lords  under  ordi 
nary  circumstances ;  but  when,  in  addition 
to  the  duties  of  host,  the  maker  of  soles  has 
to  think  out  a  recipe  for  the  making  of  an 
aristocrat  out  of  a  deceased  plebe,  a  polite 
drawing-room  manner  is  hardly  to  be  ex 
pected.  Mr.  Terwilliger's  manner  remained 
of  the  kind  to  be  expected  under  the  cir 
cumstances,  neither  better  nor  worse,  until 
the  flunky  at  the  door  announced,  in  sten 
torian  tones,  "The  Hearl  of  Mugley." 

The  "  Hearl  "  of  Mugley  seemed  to  be 
the  open  sesame  to  the  door  betwixt  Ter- 
williger  and  success.  Simultaneously  with 
the  entrance  of  the  earl  the  solution  of  his 
problem  flashed  across  the  mind  of  the 
master  of  Bangletop,  and  his  affronting  de 
meanor,  his  preoccupation  and  all  disap 
peared  in  an  instant.  Indeed,  so  elegantly 


78      THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF   BANGLETOP 

enthusiastic  was  his  reception  of  the  earl 
that  Lady  Maud  Sniffles,  on  the  other  side 
of  the  room,  whispered  in  the  ear  of  the 
Hon.  Miss  Pottleton  that  Mugley's  credit 
ors  were  in  luck ;  to  which  the  Hon.  Miss 
Pottleton,  whose  smiles  upon  the  nobleman 
had  been  returned  unopened,  curved  her 
upper  lip  spitefully,  and  replied  that  they 
were  indeed,  but  she  didn't  envy  Ariadne 
that  pompous  little  error  of  nature's,  the 
earl. 

"Howdy  do,  Earl?"  said  Terwilliger. 
"  Glad  to  see  you  looking  so  well.  How's 
your  mamma?" 

"  The  countess  is  in  her  usual  state  of 
health,  Mr.  Terwilliger,"  returned  the  earl. 

"  Ain't  she  coming  this  afternoon  ?" 

"  I  really  can't  say,"  answered  Mugley. 
"  I  asked  her  if  she  was  coming,  and  all  she 
did  was  to  call  for  her  salts.  She's  a  little 
given  to  fain  ting -spells,  and  the  slightest 
shock  rather  upsets  her." 

And  then  the  earl  turned  on  his  heel  and 
sought  out  the  fair  Ariadne,  while  Terwilli 
ger,  excusing  himself,  left  the  assemblage, 
and  went  directly  to  his  private  office  in  the 


THE'  H'EARL  OF  MUGT.EY 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP      8 1 

crypt  of  the  Greek  chapel.  Arrived  there, 
he  seated  himself  at  his  desk  and  wrote  the 
following  formal  card,  which  he  put  in  an 
envelope  and  addressed  to  the  Earl  of  Mug- 
ley  : 

"  If  the  Earl  of  Mugley  will  call  at  the 
private  office  of  Mr.  H.  Judson  Terwilliger 
at  once,  he  will  not  only  greatly  oblige  Mr. 
H.  Judson  Terwilliger,  but  may  also  hear  of 
something  to  his  advantage." 

The  card  written,  Terwilliger  summoned 
an  attendant,  ordered  a  quantity  of  liqueurs, 
whiskey,  sherry,  port,  and  lemon  squash  for 
two  to  be  brought  to  the  office,  and  then 
sent  his  communication  to  the  earl. 

Now  the  earl  was  a  great  stickler  for  eti 
quette,  and  he  did  not  at  all  like  the  idea  of 
one  in  his  position  waiting  upon  one  of  Mr. 
Terwilliger's  rank,  or  lack  of  rank,  and,  at 
first  thought,  he  was  inclined  to  ignore  the 
request  of  his  host,  but  a  combination  of 
circumstances  served  to  change  his  resolu 
tion.  He  so  seldom  heard  anything  to  his 
advantage  that,  for  mere  novelty's  sake,  he 
thought  he  would  do  as  he  was  asked ;  but 
the  question  of  his  dignity  rose  up  again, 


82      THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF  BANGLETOP 

and  shoving  the  note  into  his  pocket  he 
tried  to  forget  it.  After  five  minutes  he 
found  he  could  not  forget  it,  and  putting  his 
hand  into  the  pocket  for  the  missive,  mean 
ing  to  give  it  a  second  reading,  he  drew  out 
another  paper  by  mistake,  which  was,  in 
brief,  a  reminder  from  a  firm  of  London 
lawyers  that  he  owed  certain  clients  of 
theirs  a  few  thousands  of  pounds  for  the 
clothing  that  had  adorned  his  back  for  the 
last  two  years,  and  stating  that  proceedings 
would  be  begun  if  at  the  expiration  of  three 
months  the  account  was  not  paid  in  full. 
The  reminder  settled  it.  The  Earl  of  Mug- 
ley  graciously  concluded  to  grant  Mr.  H. 
Judson  Terwilliger  an  audience  in  the  pri 
vate  office  under  the  Greek  chapel. 

"Sit  down,  Earl,  and  have  a  cream  de 
mint  with  me,"  said  Terwilliger,  as  the  earl, 
four  minutes  later,  entered  the  apartment. 

"  Thanks,"  returned  the  earl.  "  Beauti 
ful  color  that,"  he  added,  pleasantly,  smack 
ing  his  lips  with  satisfaction  as  the  soft 
green  fluid  disappeared  from  the  glass  into 
his  inner  earl. 

"Fine,"  said  Terwilliger.    "  Little  unripe, 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP      83 

perhaps,  but  pleasant  to  the  eye.  I  prefer 
the  hue  of  the  Maraschino,  myself.  Just 
taste  that  Maraschino,  Earl.  It's  Ai ;  thirty- 
six  dollars  a  case." 

"  You  wanted  to  see  me  about  some  mat 
ter  of  interest  to  both  of  us,  I  believe,  Mr. 
Terwilliger,"  said  the  earl,  declining  the 
proffered  Maraschino. 

"  Well,  yes,"  returned  Terwilliger.  "  More 
of  interest  to  you,  perhaps,  than  to  me.  The 
fact  is,  Earl,  I've  taken  quite  a  shine  to  you, 
so  much  of  a  one  in  fact,  that  I've  looked 
you  up  at  a  commercial  agency,  and  H.  J. 
Terwilliger  never  does  that  unless  he's 
mightily  interested  in  a  man." 

"  I — er — I  hope  you  are  not  to  be  preju 
diced  against  me,"  the  earl  said,  uneasily, 
"  by — er — by  what  those  cads  of  tradesmen 
say  about  me." 

"  Not  a  bit,"  returned  Terwilliger — "  not 
a  bit.  In  fact,  what  I've  discovered  has 
prejudiced  me  in  your  favor.  You  are  just 
the  man  I've  been  looking  for  for  some 
days.  I've  wanted  a  man  with  three  A  blood 
and  three  Z  finances  for  'most  a  week  now, 
and  from  what  I  gather  from  Burke  and 


84      THE   SPECTRE    COOK    OF   BANGLETOP 

Bradstreet,  you  fill  the  bill.  You  owe  pretty 
much  everybody  from  your  tailor  to  the  col 
lector  of  pew  rents  at  your  church,  eh  ?" 

"  I've  been  unfortunate  in  financial  mat 
ters,"  returned  the  earl ;  "  but  I  have  left 
the  family  name  untarnished." 

"  So  I  believe,  Earl.  That's  what  I  ad 
mire  about  you.  Some  men  with  your  debts 
would  be  driven  to  drink  or  other  pastimes 
of  a  more  or  less  tarnishing  nature,  and  I 
admire  you  for  the  admirable  restraint  you 
have  put  upon  yourself.  You  owe,  I  am 
told,  about  twenty-seven  thousand  pounds." 

"  My  secretary  has  the  figures,  I  believe," 
said  the  earl,  slightly  bored. 

"  Well,  we'll  say  thirty  thousand  in  round 
figures.  Now  what  hope  have  you  of  ever 
paying  that  sum  off  ?" 

"None  —  unless  I  —  er  —  well,  unless  I 
should  be  fortunate  enough  to  secure  a  rich 
wife." 

"Precisely;  that  is  exactly  what  I  thought," 
rejoined  Terwilliger.  "  Marriage  is  your 
only  asset,  and  as  yet  that  is  hardly  negoti 
able.  Now  I  have  called  you  here  this  af 
ternoon  to  make  a  proposition  to  you.  If 


THE   SPECTRE    COOK    OF  BANGLETOP       85 

you  will  marry  according  to  my  wishes  I 
will  give  you  an  income  of  five  thousand 
pounds  a  year  for  the  next  five  years." 

"  I  don't  quite  understand  you,"  the  earl 
replied,  in  a  disappointed  tone.  It  was  evi 
dent  that  five  thousand  pounds  per  annum 
was  too  small  a  figure  for  his  tastes. 

"  I  think  I  was  quite  plain,"  said  Ter- 
williger,  and  he  repeated  his  offer. 

"  I  certainly  admire  the  lady  very  much," 
said  the  earl ;  "  but  the  settlement  of  in 
come  seems  very  small." 

Terwilliger  opened  his  eyes  wide  with  as 
tonishment.  "  Oh,  you  admire  the  lady, 
eh  ?"  he  said.  "  Well,  there  is  no  account 
ing  for  tastes." 

"  You  surprise  me  slightly,"  said  the  earl, 
in  response  to  this  remark.  "  The  lady  is 
certainly  worthy  of  any  man's  admira 
tion.  She  is  refined,  cultivated,  beautiful, 
and—" 

"  Ahem  !"  said  Terwilliger.  "  May  I  ask, 
my  dear  Earl,  to  whom  you  refer  ?" 

"  To  Ariadne,  of  course.  I  thought  your 
course  somewhat  unusual,  but  we  do  not 
pretend  to  comprehend  you  Americans  over 


86       THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP 

here.  Your  proposition  is  that  I  shall  mar 
ry  Ariadne  ?" 

I  hesitate  to  place  on  record  what  Ter- 
williger  said  in  answer  to  this  statement. 
It  was  forcible  rather  than  polite,  and  the 
earl  from  that  moment  adopted  a  new  sim 
ile  for  degrees  of  profanity,  substituting  "to 
swear  like  an  American  "  for  the  old  forms 
having  to  do  with  pirates  and  troopers. 
The  string  of  expletives  was  about  five 
minutes  in  length,  at  the  end  of  which 
time  Terwilliger  managed  to  say: 

"  No  such  d proposition  ever  entered 

my  mind.  I  want  you  to  marry  a  cold, 
misty,  musty  spectre,  nothing  more  or  less, 
and  I'll  tell  you  why." 

And  then  he  proceeded  to  tell  the  Earl  of 
Mugley  all  that  he  knew  of  the  history  of 
Bangletop  Hall,  concluding  with  a  narra 
tion  of  his  experiences  with  the  ghost  cook. 

"  My  rent  here,"  he  said,  in  conclusion, 
"is  five  thousand  pounds  per  annum.  The 
advertising  I  get  out  of  the  fact  of  my  be 
ing  here  and  swelling  it  with  you  nabobs  is 
worth  twenty-five  thousand  pounds  a  year, 
and  I'm  willing  to  pay,  in  good  hard  cash, 


THE   SPECTRE    COOK    OF   BANGLETOP       89 

twenty  per  cent,  of  that  amount  rather  than 
be  forced  to  give  up.  Now  here's  your 
chance  to  get  an  income  without  an  encum 
brance  and  stave  off  your  creditors.  Mar 
ry  the  spook,  so  that  she  can  go  back  to  the 
spirit  land  a  countess  and  make  it  hot  for 
the  Bangletops,  and  don't  be  so  allfired 
proud.  She'll  be  disappointed  enough  I 
can  tell  you,  when  I  inform  her  that  an  earl 
was  the  best  I  could  do,  the  promised  duke 
not  being  within  reach.  If  she  says  earls 
are  drugs  in  the  market,  I  won't  be  able  to 
deny  it ;  and,  after  all,  my  lad,  a  good  cook 
is  a  greater  blessing  in  this  world  than  any 
earl  that  ever  lived,  and  a  blamed  sight 
rarer." 

"Your  proposition  is  absolutely  ridicu 
lous,  Mr.  Terwilliger,"  replied  the  earl. 
"I'd  look  well  marrying  a  draught  from 
a  dark  cavern,  as  you  call  it,  now  wouldn't 
I  ?  To  say  nothing  of  the  impossibility  of 
a  Mugley  marrying  a  cook.  I  cannot  en 
tertain  the  proposition." 

"  You'll  find  you  can't  entertain  anything 
if  you  don't  watch  out,"  fumed  Terwilliger, 
in  return. 


90      THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF  BANGLETOP 

"I'm  not  so  sure  about  that,"  replied  the 
earl,  haughtily,  sipping  his  lemon  squash. 
"  I  fancy  Miss  Ariadne  is  not  entirely  in 
different  to  me." 

"Well,  you  might  just  as  well  understand 
on  this  i8th  day  of  July,  18 — ,  as  any  other 
time,  that  my  daughter  Ariadne  never  be 
comes  the  Earless  of  Mugley,"  said  Ter- 
williger,  in  a  tone  of  exasperation. 

"  Not  even  when  her  father  considers  the 
commercial  value  of  such  an  alliance  for  his 
daughter  ?"  retorted  the  earl,  shaking  his 
finger  in  Terwilliger's  face.  "  Not  even 
when  the  President  of  the  Three -dollar 
Shoe  Company,  of  Soleton,  Massachusetts 
(Limited),  considers  the  advertising  sure 
to  result  from  a  marriage  between  his  house 
and  that  of  Mugley,  with  presents  from  her 
majesty  the  queen,  the  Duke  of  York  act 
ing  as  best  man,  and  telegrams  of  congrat 
ulation  from  the  crowned  heads  of  Europe 
pouring  in  at  the  rate  of  two  an  hour  for 
half  as  many  hours  as  there  are  thrones  ?" 

Terwilliger  turned  pale. 

The  picture  painted  by  the  earl  was  ter 
ribly  alluring. 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF  BANGLETOP       9 1 

He  hesitated. 

He  was  lost. 

"  Mugley,"  he  whispered,  hoarsely — 
"  Mugley,  I  have  wronged  you.  I  thought 
you  were  a  fortune-hunter.  I  see  you  love 
her.  Take  her,  my  boy,  and  pass  me  the 
brandy." 

"Certainly,  Mr.  Terwilliger,"  replied  the 
earl,  affably.  "  And  then,  if  you've  no  ob 
jection,  you  may  pass  it  back,  and  I'll  join 
you  in  a  thimbleful  myself." 

And  then  the  two  men  drank  each  oth 
er's  health  in  silence,  which  was  prolonged 
for  at  least  five  minutes,  during  which  time 
the  earl  and  his  host  both  appeared  to  be 
immersed  in  deep  thought. 

"  Come,"  said  Terwilliger  at  last.  "  Let 
us  go  back  to  the  drawing-room,  or  they'll 
miss  us,  and,  by-the-way,  you  might  speak 
of  that  little  matter  to  Ariadne  to-night. 
It'll  help  the  fall  trade  to  have  the  engage 
ment  announced." 

"  I  will,  Mr.  Terwilliger,"  returned  the 
earl,  as  they  started  to  leave  the  room ; 
"but  I  say,  father-in-law  elect,"  he  whis 
pered,  catching  Terwilliger's  coat  sleeve  and 


92       THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF  BANGLETOP 

drawing  him  back  into  the  office  for  an  in 
stant,  "  you  couldn't  let  me  have  five  pounds 
on  account  this  evening,  could  you  ?" 

Two  minutes  later  Terwilliger  and  the 
earl  appeared  in  the  drawing-room,  the  for 
mer  looking  haggard  and  worn,  his  eyes  fe 
verishly  bright,  and  his  manner  betraying 
the  presence  of  disturbing  elements  in  his 
nerve  centres ;  the  latter  smiling  more  affa 
bly  than  was  consistent  with  his  title,  and 
jingling  a  number  of  gold  coins  in  his  pock 
et,  which  his  intimate  friend  and  old  college 
chum,  Lord  Dufferton,  on  the  other  side  of 
the  room,  marvelled  at  greatly,  for  he  knew 
well  that  upon  the  earl's  arrival  at  Bangle- 
top  Hall  an  hour  before  his  pockets  were 
as  empty  as  a  flunky's  head. 


IV 


Terwilliger's  time  was  almost  up.  The 
hour  for  his  interview  with  the  spectre  cook 
of  Bangletop  was  hardly  forty-eight  hours 
distant,  and  he  was  wellnigh  distracted.  No 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF  BANGLETOP      93 

solution  of  the  problem  seemed  possible 
since  the  earl  had  so  peremptorily  declined 
to  fall  in  with  his  plan.  He  was  glad  the 
earl  had  done  so,  for  otherwise  he  would 
have  been  denied  the  tremendous  satisfac 
tion  which  the  consummation  of  an  alliance 
between  his  own  and  one  of  the  oldest  and 
noblest  houses  of  England  was  about  to 
give  him,  not  to  mention  the  commercial 
phase  of  the  situation,  which  had  been  so 
potent  a  factor  in  bringing  the  engagement 
about ;  for  Ariadne  had  said  yes  to  the  earl 
that  same  night,  and  the  betrothal  was  short 
ly  to  be  announced.  It  would  have  been 
announced  at  once,  only  the  earl  felt  that  he 
should  break  the  news  himself  first  to  his 
mother,  the  countess — an  operation  which 
he  dreaded,  and  for  which  he  believed  some 
eight  or  ten  weeks  of  time  were  necessary. 

"  What  is  the  matter,  Judson  ?"  Mrs.  Ter- 
williger  asked  finally,  her  husband  was  grow 
ing  so  careworn  of  aspect. 

"  Nothing,  my  dear,  nothing." 

"  But  there  is  something,  Judson,  and  as 
your  wife  I  demand  to  know  what  it  is. 
Perhaps  I  can  help  you." 


94      THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF  BANGLETOP 

And  then  Mr.  Terwilliger  broke  down, 
and  told  the  whole  story  to  Mrs.  Terwilli 
ger,  omitting  no  detail,  stopping  only  to 
bring  that  worthy  lady  to  on  the  half-dozen 
or  more  occasions  when  her  emotions  were 
too  strong  for  her  nerves,  causing  her  to 
swoon.  When  he  had  quite  done,  she 
looked  him  reproachfully  in  the  eye,  and 
said  that  if  he  had  told  her  the  truth  in 
stead  of  deceiving  her  on  the  night  of  the 
spectral  visitation,  he  might  have  been 
spared  all  his  trouble. 

"  For  you  know,  Judson,"  she  said,  "  I 
have  made  a  study  of  the  art  of  acquiring 
titles.  Since  I  read  the  story  of  the  girl 
who  started  in  life  as  an  innkeeper's  daugh 
ter  and  died  a  duchess,  by  Elizabeth  Har- 
ley  Hicks,  of  Salem,  and  realized  how  one 
might  be  lowly  born  and  yet  rise  to  lofty 
heights,  it  has  been  my  dearest  wish  that 
my  girls  might  become  noblewomen,  and  at 
times,  Judson,  I  have  even  hoped  that  you 
might  yet  become  a  duke." 

"Great  Scott!"  ejaculated  Terwilliger. 
"That  would  be  awful.  Hankinson,  Duke 
of  Terwilliger!  Why,  Molly,  I'd  never  be 


"  '  A  DUKE'S  A  DUKE  THE  WORLD  OVER '  " 


THE    SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP      97 

able  to  hold  up  my  head  in  shoe  circles 
with  a  name  on  me  like  that." 

"  Is  there  nothing  in  the  world  but  shoes, 
Judson  ?"  asked  his  wife,  seriously. 

"You'll  find  shoes  are  the  foundation 
upon  which  society  stands,"  chuckled  Ter- 
williger  in  return. 

"  You  are  never  serious,"  returned  Mrs. 
Terwilliger;  "but  now  you  must  be.  You 
are  coping  with  the  supernatural.  Now  I 
have  discovered,"  continued  the  lady,  "  that 
there  are  three  methods  by  which  titles  are 
acquired — birth,  marriage,  and  purchase." 

"You  forget  the  fourth — achievement," 
suggested  Terwilliger. 

"  Not  these  days,  Judson.  It  used  to  be 
so,  but  it  is  not  so  now.  Now  the  spectre 
hasn't  birth,  we  can't  get  any  living  duke  to 
marry  her,  dead  dukes  are  hard  to  find,  so 
there's  nothing  to  do  but  to  buy  her  a  title." 

"  But  where  ?" 

"  In  Italy.  You  can  get  'em  by  the  doz 
en.  Every  hand-organ  grinder  in  America 
grinds  away  in  the  hope  of  going  back  to 
Italy  and  purchasing  a  title.  Why  can't 
you  do  the  same?" 

7 


98        THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF   BANGLETOP 

"  Me  ?  Me  grind  a  hand-organ  in  Amer 
ica?"  cried  Hankinson. 

"No,  no;  purchase  a  dukedom." 

"  I  don't  want  a  dukedom  ;  I  want  a  duch- 
essdom." 

"  That's  all  right.  Buy  the  title,  give  it 
to  the  cook,  and  let  her  marry  some  spectre 
of  her  own  rank  ;  she  can  give  him  the  title  ; 
and  there  you  are  !" 

"  Good  scheme  !"  cried  Terwilliger.  "  But 
I  say,  Molly,  don't  you  think  it  would  be  bet 
ter  to  get  her  to  bring  the  spectre  over  here, 
and  have  me  give  him  the  title,  and  then  let 
him  marry  her  here  ?" 

"  No,  I  don't.  If  you  give  it  to  him  first, 
the  chances  are  he  would  go  back  on  his 
bargain.  He'd  say  that,  being  a  duke,  he 
couldn't  marry  a  cook." 

"You  have  a  large  mind,  Molly,"  said 
Terwilliger. 

"  I  know  men  !"  snapped  Mrs.  Terwilliger. 

And  so  it  happened.  Hankinson  Judson 
Terwilliger  applied  by  wire  to  the  authori 
ties  in  Rome  for  all  right,  title,  and  interest 
in  one  dukedom,  free  from  encumbrances, 
irrevocable,  and  duly  witnessed  by  the  prop- 


THE   SPECTRE   COOK    OF  BANGLETOP        99 

er  dignitaries  of  the  Italian  government,  and 
at  the  second  interview  with  the  spectre 
cook  of  Bangletop,  he  was  able  to  show  her 
a  cablegram  received  from  the  Eternal  City 
stating  that  the  papers  would  be  sent  upon 
receipt  of  the  applicant's  check  for  one  hun 
dred  lire. 

"  'Ow  much  his  that  ?"  asked  the  ghost. 

"One  hundred  lire?"  returned  Terwilli- 
ger,  repeating  the  sum  to  gain  time  to  think. 
He  was  himself  surprised  at  the  cheapness 
of  the  duchy,  and  he  was  afraid  that  if  the 
ghost  knew  its  real  value  she  would  decline 
to  take  it.  "  One  hundred  lire  ?  Why,  that's 
about  750,000  dollars — 150,000  pounds. 
They  charge  high  for  their  titles,"  he  add 
ed,  blushing  slightly. 

"  Pretty  'igh,"  returned  the  ghost.  "  But 
h'l  carn't  be  a  duke,  ye  know.  'Ow'll  I 
manidge  that  ?" 

Hankinson  explained  his  wife's  scheme 
to  the  spectre. 

"That's  helegant,"  said  she.  "  H'I've 
loved  a  butler  o'  the  Bangletops  for  nigh 
hon  to  two  'undred  years,  but,  some'ow  or 
hother,  he's  kep'  shy  o'  me.  This  '11  fix  'im. 


100     THE   SPECTRE   COOK   OF   BANGLETOP 

But  h'l  say,  Mr.  Terwilliger,  his  one  o'  them 
Heyetalian  dukes  as  good  as  a  Henglish 
one?" 

"  Every  bit,"  said  Terwilliger.  "  A  duke's 
a  duke  the  world  over.  Don't  you  know  the 
lines  of  Burns, '  A  duke's  a  duke  for  a'  that?" 

"  Never  'card  of  'im,"  replied  the  ghost. 

"  Well,  you  look  him  up  when  you  get  set 
tled  down  at  home.  He  was  a  smart  man 
here,  and,  if  his  ghost  does  him  justice, 
you'll  be  mighty  glad  to  know  him,"  Ter 
williger  answered. 

And  thus  was  Bangletop  Hall  delivered 
of  its  uncanny  visitor.  The  ducal  appoint 
ment,  entitling  its  owner  to  call  himself 
"  Duke  of  Cavalcadi,"  was  received  in  due 
time,  and  handed  over  to  the  curse  of  the 
kitchen,  who  immediately  disappeared,  and 
permanently,  from  the  haunts  that  had 
known  her  for  so  long  and  so  disadvan- 
tageously.  Bangletop  Hall  is  now  the 
home  of  a  happy  family,  to  whom  all  are 
devoted,  and  from  whose  menage  no  cook 
has  ever  been  known  to  depart,  save  for 
natural  causes,  despite  all  that  has  gone 
before. 


BACK   TO   THE   SPIRIT   VALE 


THE    SPECTRE    COOK    OK   BANGLETOP      103 

Ariadne  has  become  Countess  of  Mug- 
ley,  and  Mrs.  Terwilliger  is  content  with 
her  Judson,  whom,  however,  she  occasion 
ally  calls  Duke  of  Cavalcadi,  claiming 
that  he  is  the  representative  of  that  an 
cient  and  noble  family  on  earth.  As  for 
Judson,  he  always  smiles  when  his  wife 
calls  him  Duke,  but  denies  the  titular  im 
peachment,  for  he  is  on  good  terms  with 
his  landlord,  whose  admiration  for  his  ten 
ant's  wholly  unexpected  ability  to  retain  his 
cook  causes  him  to  regard  him  as  a  super 
natural  being,  and  therefore  worthy  of  a 
Bangletop's  regard. 

"  All  of  which,"  Terwilliger  says  to  Mrs. 
Terwilliger,  "might  not  be  so,  my  dear,  were 
I  really  the  duke,  for  I  honestly  believe  that 
if  there  is  a  feud  of  long  standing  anywhere 
in  the  universe,  it  is  between  the  noble  fam 
ilies  of  Bangletop  and  Cavalcadi  over  on 
the  other  shore." 


THE  SPECK  ON  THE  LENS 

"TALKING  about  inventions,"  said  the 
oculist,  as  he  very  dexterously  pocketed 
two  of  the  pool  balls,  the  handsome  ringer, 
more  familiarly  known  as  the  fifteen  ball, 
and  the  white  ball  itself,  thereby  adding 
somewhat  to  the  minus  side  of  his  string — 
"talking  about  inventions,  I  had  a  curious 
experience  last  August.  It  was  an  experi 
ence  which  was  not  only  interesting  from 
an  inventive  point  of  view,  but  it  had  like 
wise  a  moral,  which  will  become  more  or 
less  obvious  as  I  unfold  the  story. 

"You  know  I  rented  and  occupied  a  place 
in  Yonkers  last  summer.  It  was  situated  on 
the  high  lands  to  the  north  of  the  city,  a 
little  this  side  of  Greystone,  overlooking 
that  magnificent  stream,  the  Hudson,  the 
ever-varying  beauties  of  which  so  few  of 
the  residents  along  its  banks  really  appreci- 


THE  SPECK  ON  THE  LENS      105 

ate.  It  was  a  comfortable  spot,  with  a  few 
trees  about  it,  a  decent-sized  garden — large 
enough  to  raise  a  tomato  or  two  for  a  Sun 
day-night  salad — and  a  lawn  which  was  a 
cure  for  sore  eyes,  its  soft,  sheeny  surface 
affording  a  most  restful  object  upon  which 
to  feast  the  tired  optic.  I  believe  it  was 
that  lawn  that  first  attracted  me  as  I  drove 
by  the  place  with  a  patient  I  had  in  tow. 
It  was  just  after  a  heavy  shower,  and  the 
sun  breaking  through  the  clouds  and  light 
ing  up  the  rain-soaked  grass  gave  to  it  a 
glistening  golden  greenness  that  to  my  eyes 
was  one  of  the  most  beautiful  and  soul-sat 
isfying  bits  of  color  I  had  seen  in  a  long 
time.  'Oh,  for  a  summer  of  that !'  I  said  to 
myself,  little  thinking  that  the  beginning  of 
a  summer  thereof  was  to  fall  to  my  lot  be 
fore  many  days — for  on  May  ist  I  signed 
papers  which  made  me  to  all  intents  and 
purposes  proprietor  of  the  place  for  the  en 
suing  six  months. 

"At  one  corner  of  the  grounds  stood,  I 
should  say,  a  dozen  apple-trees,  the  spread 
ing  branches  of  which  seemed  to  form  a 
roof  for  a  sort  of  enchanted  bower,  in  which, 


106  THE    SPECK    ON    THE    LENS 

you  may  be  sure,  I  passed  many  of  my  lei 
sure  hours,  swinging  idly  in  a  hammock,  the 
cool  breezes  from  the  Hudson,  concerning 
which  so  many  people  are  sceptical,  but 
which  nevertheless  exist,  bringing  delight 
to  the  ear  and  nostril  as  well  as  to  the 
'fevered  brow,'  which  is  so  fashionable  in 
the  neighborhood  of  New  York  in  the  sum 
mer,  making  the  leaves  rustle  in  a  tuneful 
sort  of  fashion,  and  laden  heavily  with  the 
sweet  odors  of  many  a  garden  close  over 
which  they  passed  before  they  got  to  me." 

"  Put  that  in  rhyme,  doctor,  and  there's 
your  poem,"  said  the  lieutenant,  as  he  made 
a  combination  scratch  involving  every  ball 
on  the  table. 

"  I'll  do  it,"  said  the  doctor ;  "  and  then 
I'll  have  it  printed  as  Appendix  J  to  the 
third  edition  of  my  work  on  Sixty  Astigma 
tisms,  and  How  to  Acquire  Ttiem.  But  to  get 
back  to  my  story,"  he  continued.  "  I  was 
lying  there  in  my  hammock  one  afternoon 
trying  to  take  a  census  of  the  butterflies  in 
sight,  when  I  thought  I  heard  some  one 
back  of  me  call  me  by  name.  Instantly 
the  butterfly  census  was  forgotten,  and  I 


THE    SPECK.   ON    THE    LENS  107 

was  on  the  alert ;  but — whether  there  was 
something  the  matter  with  my  eyes  or  not, 
I  do  not  know — despite  all  my  alertness, 
there  wasn't  a  soul  in  sight  that  I  could 
see.  Of  course,  I  was  slightly  mystified  at 
first,  and  then  I  attributed  the  interruption 
either  to  imagination  or  to  some  passer-by, 
whose  voice,  wafted  on  the  breeze,  might 
have  reached  my  ears.  I  threw  myself 
back  into  the  hammock  once  more,  and 
was  just  about  dozing  off  to  the  lullaby 
stfng  by  a  bee  to  the  accompaniment  of  the 
rustling  leaves,  when  I  again  heard  my 
name  distinctly  spoken. 

"This  time  there  was  no  mistake  about 
it,  for  as  I  sprang  to  my  feet  and  looked 
about,  I  saw  coming  towards  me  a  man  of 
unpleasantly  cadaverous  aspect,  whose  years, 
I  should  judge,  were  at  least  eighty  in 
number.  His  beard  was  so  long  and  scant 
that,  to  keep  the  breezes  from  blowing  it 
about  to  his  discomfort,  he  had  tucked  the 
ends  of  it  into  his  vest  pocket ;  his  eyes, 
black  as  coals,  were  piercing  as  gimlets, 
their  sharpness  equalled  by  nothing  that  I 
had  ever  seen,  excepting  perhaps  the  point 


108      THE  SPECK  ON  THE  LENS 

of  this  same  person's  nose,  which  was  long 
and  thin,  suggesting  a  razor  with  a  bowie 
point ;  his  slight  body  was  clad  in  sombre 
garb,  and  at  first  glance  he  appeared  to  me 
so  disquietingly  like  a  visitor  from  the  super 
natural  world  that  I  shuddered ;  but  when 
he  spoke,  his  voice  was  all  gentleness,  and 
whatever  of  fear  I  had  experienced  was  in  a 
moment  dissipated. 

" '  You  are  Doctor  Carey  ?'  he  said,  in  a 
timid  sort  of  fashion. 

"  '  Yes,'  I  replied  ;  '  I  am.  What  can  I 
do  for  you  ?' 

"  '  The  distinguished  oculist  ?'  he  added, 
as  if  not  hearing  my  question. 

" '  Well,  I'm  a  sort  of  notorious  eye-doc 
tor,'  I  answered,  my  well-known  modesty 
preventing  my  entire  acquiescence  in  his 
manner  of  putting  it. 

"  He  smiled  pleasantly  as  I  said  this,  and 
then  drew  out  of  his  coat-tail  pocket  a  small 
tin  box,  which,  until  he  opened  it,  I  sup 
posed  contained  a  drinking -cup  —  one  of 
those  folding  tin  cups. 

"  '  Doctor  Carey,'  said  he,  sitting  down  in 
the  hammock  which  I  had  vacated,  and  toy- 


THE    SPECK    ON    THE    LENS  1 09 

ing  with  the  tin  box — a  proceeding  that  was 
so  extraordinarily  cool  that  it  made  me 
shiver — '  I  have  been  looking  for  you  for 
just  sixty-three  mortal  years.' 

"'Excuse  me,'  I  returned,  as  nonchalantly 
as  I  could,  considering  the  fact  that  I  was 
beginning  to  be  annoyed — 'excuse  me,  but 
that  statement  seems  to  indicate  that  I  was 
born  famous,  which  I'm  inclined  to  doubt. 
Inasmuch  as  I  am  not  yet  fifty  years  old,  I 
cannot  understand  how  it  has  come  to  pass 
that  you  have  been  looking  for  me  for  sixty- 
three  years.' 

" '  Nevertheless,  my  statement  was  cor 
rect,'  said  he.  '  I  have  been  looking  for 
you  for  sixty-three  years,  but  not  for  you  as 
you.' 

"This  made  me  laugh,  although  it  added 
slightly  to  my  nervousness,  which  was  now 
beginning  to  return.  To  have  a  man  with  a 
tin  box  in  his  hand  tell  me  he  had  been 
looking  for  me  for  thirteen  years  longer 
than  I  had  lived,  and  then  to  have  him  add 
that  it  was  not,  however,  me  as  myself  that 
he  wanted,  was  amusing  in  a  sense,  and  yet 
I  could  not  help  feeling  that  it  would  be  a 


IIO  THE    SPECK    ON    THE    LENS 

relief  to  know  that  the  tin  box  did  hold  a 
drinking-cup,  and  not  dynamite. 

"  'You  seem  to  speak  English,'  I  said,  in 
answer  to  this  remark,  '  and  I  have  always 
thought  I  understood  that  language  pretty 
well,  but  you'll  excuse  me  if  I  say  that  I 
don't  see  your  point.' 

" '  Why  is  it  that  great  men  are  so  fre 
quently  obtuse?'  he  said,  languidly,  giving 
the  ground  such  a  push  with  his  toe  that  it 
set  the  hammock  swinging  furiously.  '  When 
I  say  that  I  have  searched  for  you  all  these 
years,  but  not  for  you  as  you,  I  mean  not 
for  you  as  Dr.  Carey,  not  for  you  as  an  in 
dividual,  but  for  you  as  the  possessor  of  a 
very  rare  eye.' 

"'Go  on,'  I  said,  feebly,  and  rubbed  my 
forehead,  thinking  perhaps  my  brains  had 
got  into  a  tangle,  and  were  responsible  for 
this  extraordinary  affair.  '  What  is  the  pe 
culiar  quality  which  makes  my  eye  so  rare  ?' 

" '  There  is  only  one  pair  of  eyes  like 
them  in  the  world,  that  I  know  of,'  said  the 
stranger,  'and  I  have  visited  all  lands  in 
search  of  them  and  experimented  with  all 
kinds  of  eyes.' 


THE    SPECK    ON    THE    LENS  III 

"  '  And  I  am  the  proud  possessor  of  that 
pair  ?'  I  queried,  becoming  slightly  more  in 
terested. 

" '  Not  you,'  said  he.  '  You  and  I  together 
possess  that  pair,  however.' 

"  '  You  and  I  ?'  I  cried. 

"  '  Yes,'  said  he.  '  Your  left  eye  and  my 
right  have  the  honor  of  being  the  only  two 
unique  eyes  in  the  world.' 

" '  That's  queer  too,'  I  observed,  a  mixt 
ure  of  sarcasm  and  flippancy  in  my  tones, 
I  fear.  '  You  mean  twonique,  don't  you  ?' 

"The  old  gentleman  drew  himself  up  with 
dignity,  made  a  gesture  of  impatience,  and 
remarked  that  if  I  intended  to  be  flippant 
he  would  leave  me.  Of  course  I  would  not 
hear  of  this,  now  that  my  curiosity  had  been 
aroused,  and  so  I  apologized. 

'"Don't  mention  it,' he  said.  'But,  my 
dear  doctor,  you  cannot  imagine  my  sen 
sations  when  I  found  your  eye  yester 
day.' 

" '  Oh !  You  found  it  yesterday,  did  you  ?' 
I  put  in. 

"'Yes,' he  said.    'On  Forty-third  Street.' 

"  '  I  was  on  Forty-third  Street  yesterday,' 


112  THE    SPECK    ON    THE    LENS 

I  replied,  'but  really  I  was  not  conscious  of 
the  loss  of  my  eye.' 

"'Nobody  said  you  had  lost  it,'  said  my 
visitor.  '  I  only  said  I  had  found  it.  I 
mean  by  that  that  I  found*it  as  Columbus 
found  America.  America  was  not  neces 
sarily  lost  before  it  was  found.  I  had  the 
good  fortune  to  be  passing  through  the 
street  as  you  left  your  club.  I  glanced  into 
your  face  as  I  passed,  caught  sight  of  your 
eye,  and  my  heart  stood  still.  There  at  last 
was  that  for  which  I  had  so  long  and  so 
earnestly  searched,  and  so  overcome  was  I 
with  joy  at  my  discovery  that  I  seemed  to 
lose  all  power  of  speech,  of  locomotion,  or 
of  sane  thought,  and  not  until  you  had 
passed  entirely  out  of  sight  did  I  return 
really  to  my  senses.  Then  I  rushed  madly 
into  the  club-house  I  had  seen  you  leave  a 
few  moments  before,  described  you  to  the 
man  at  the  door,  learned  your  name  and 
address,  and — well,  here  I  am.' 

" '  And  what  does  all  this  extraordinary 
nonsense  lead  up  to  ?'  I  asked.  '  What  do 
you  intend  to  do  about  my  eye  ?  Do  you 
wish  to  borrow  it,  buy  it,  or  steal  it  ?' 


THE    SPECK    ON    THE    LENS  113 

" '  Doctor  Carey,'  said  my  visitor,  sadly, 
'  I  shall  not  live  very  long.  I  have  reason 
to  believe  that  another  summer  will  find  me 
in  my  grave,  and  I  do  not  want  to  die  with 
out  imparting  to  the  world  the  news  of  a 
marvellous  discovery  I  have  made — the  de 
tails  of  a  wonderful  invention  that  I  have 
not  only  conceived,  but  have  actually  put 
into  working  order.  I,  an  unknown  man — 
too  old  to  be  able  to  refute  the  charge  of 
senility  were  any  one  disposed  to  question 
the  value  of  my  statements — could  announce 
to  the  world  my  great  discovery  a  thousand 
times  a  day,  and  very  properly  the  world 
would  decline  to  believe  in  me.  The  world 
would  cry  humbug,  and  I  should  have  been 
unable,  had  I  failed  to  find  you,  to  convince 
the  world  that  I  was  not  a  humbug.  With 
the  discovery  of  your  eye,  all  that  is  changed. 
I  shall  have  an  ally  in  you,  and  that  is  val 
uable  for  the  reason  that  your  statements, 
whatever  they  may  be,  will  always  be  en 
titled  to  and  will  receive  respectful  atten 
tion.  Here  in  this  box  is  my  invention.  I 
shall  let  you  discover  its  marvellous  power 
for  yourself,  hoping  that  when  you  have  dis- 


114  THE    SPECK    ON    THE    LENS 

covered  its  power,  you  will  tell  the  world  of 
it,  and  of  its  inventor/ 

"With  that,"  said  the  doctor,  "the  old 
fellow  handed  me  the  tin  box,  which  I 
opened  with  considerable  misgivings  as  to 
possible  results.  There  was  no  explosion, 
however.  The  cover  came  off  easily  enough, 
and  on  the  inside  was  a  curiously  shaped 
telescope,  not  a  drinking-cup,  as  I  had  at 
first  surmised. 

" '  Why,  it's  a  telescope,  isn't  it  ?'  I  said. 

"  '  Yes.  What  did  you  suppose  it  was  ?' 
he  asked. 

" '  I  hadn't  an  idea,'  I  replied,  not  exactly 
truthfully.  '  But  it  can't  be  good  for  much 
in  this  shape,'  I  added,  for,  as  I  pulled  the 
parts  out  and  got  it  to  its  full  length,  I  found 
that  each  section  was  curved,  and  that  the 
whole  formed  an  arc,  which,  though  scarcely 
perceptible,  nevertheless  should,  it  seemed 
to  me,  have  interfered  with  the  utility  of  the 
instrument. 

" '  That's  the  point  I  want  you  to  establish 
one  way  or  the  other,'  said  my  visitor,  get 
ting  up  out  of  the  hammock,  and  pacing 
nervously  up  and  down  the  lawn.  'To  my 


THE  SPECK  ON  THE  LENS      115 

eye  that  telescope  is  a  marvel,  and  is  the  re 
sult  of  years  of  experiment.  It  fulfils  my 
expectations,  and  if  your  eye  is  what  I  think 
it  is,  I  shall  at  last  have  found  another  to 
whom  it  will  appear  the  treasure  it  appears 
to  me  to  be.  You  have  a  tower  on  your 
house,  I  see.  Let  us  go  up  on  the  roof  of 
the  tower,  and  test  the  glass.  Then  we 
shall  see  if  I  claim  too  much  for  it.' 

"The  earnestness  of  the  old  gentleman 
interested  me  hugely,  and  I  led  the  way 
through  the  garden  to  the  house,  up  the 
tower  stairs  to  the  roof,  and  then  standing 
there,  looking  across  the  river  at  the  Pali 
sades  looming  up  like  a  huge  fortress  be 
fore  me,  I  put  the  telescope  to  my  eye. 

" '  I  see  absolutely  nothing,'  I  said,  after 
vainly  trying  to  fathom  the  depths  of  the 
instrument. 

'"Alas !' began  the  old  gentleman;  and 
then  he  laughed,  nervously.  '  You  are  us 
ing  the  wrong  eye.  Try  the  other  one.  It 
is  your  left  eye  that  has  the  power  to  show 
the  virtues  of  this  glass.' 

"  I  obeyed  his  order,  and  then  a  most 
singular  thing  happened.  Strange  sights 


Il6  THE    SPECK    ON    THE    LENS 

met  my  gaze.  At  first  I  could  see  nothing 
but  the  Palisades  opposite  me,  but  in  an 
instant  my  horizon  seemed  to  broaden,  the 
vista  through  the  telescope  deepened,  and 
before  I  knew  it  my  sight  was  speeding, 
now  through  a  beautiful  country,  over  fields, 
hills,  and  valleys ;  then  on  through  great 
cities,  out  to  and  over  a  broad,  gently  undu 
lating  stretch  which  I  at  once  recognized  as 
the  prairie  lands  of  the  west.  In  a  minute 
more  I  began  to  catch  the  idea  of  this 
wonderful  glass,  for  I  now  saw  rising  up 
before  me  the  wonderful  beauties  of  the 
Yosemite,  and  then,  like  a  flash  of  the 
lightning,  my  vision  passed  over  the  Sierra 
Nevada  range,  my  eye  swept  down  upon 
San  Francisco,  and  was  soon  speeding  over 
the  waters  of  the  Pacific. 

"Two  minutes  later  I  saw  the  strange 
pagodas  of  the  Chinese  rising  before  me. 
Sweeping  my  glass  to  the  north,  bleak 
Siberia  met  my  gaze ;  then  to  the  south  I 
saw  India,  her  jungles,  her  waste  places. 
Not  long  after,  a  most  awful  sight  met  my 
gaze.  I  saw  a  huge  ship  at  the  moment  of 
foundering  in  the  Indian  Ocean.  Horrified, 


THE    SPECK    ON    THE    LENS  117 

I  turned  my  glass  again  to  the  north,  and 
the  minarets  of  Stamboul  rose  up  before 
me  ;  then  the  dome  of  St.  Peter's  at  Rome  ; 
then  Paris;  then  London  ;  then  the  Altantic 
Ocean.  I  levelled  my  glass  due  west,  and 
finally  I  could  see  nothing  but  one  small, 
black  speck — as  like  to  a  fleck  of  dust  as  to 
anything  else — on  the  lens  at  the  other  end. 
With  a  movement  of  my  hand,  I  tried  to  wipe 
it  off,  but  it  still  remained,  and,  in  answer  to 
a  chuckle  at  my  side,  I  put  the  glass  down. 

" '  It  is  the  most  extraordinary  thing  I 
ever  saw,'  I  said. 

"'Yes,  it  is,'  said  the  other. 

" '  One  can  almost  see  around  the  world 
with  it,'  I  cried,  breathless  nearly  with  en 
thusiasm. 

"'One  can  —  quite,'  said  the  inventor, 
calmly. 

"  '  Nonsense  !'  I  said.  '  Don't  claim  too 
much,  my  friend.' 

"  '  It  is  true,'  said  he.  '  Did  you  notice  a 
speck  on  the  glass  ?  I  am  sure  you  did,  for 
you  tried  to  remove  it.' 

"  '  Yes,'  said  I,  '  I  did.  But  what  of  it  ? 
What  does  that  signify  ?' 


Il8  THE    SPECK    ON    THE    LENS 

" '  It  proves  what  I  said,'  he  answered. 
'  You  did  see  all  the  way  around  the  world 
with  that  glassT  The  black  spot  on  the  lens 
that  you  thought  was  a  piece  of  dust  was 
the  back  of  your  own  head.' 

"  '  Nonsense,  my  boy  !  The  back  of  my 
head  is  bigger  than  that,'  I  said. 

"  '  Certainly  it  is,'  he  responded  ;  '  but 
you  must  make  some  allowance  for  per 
spective.  The  back  of  your  head  is  a  trifle 
less  than  twenty-four  thousand  miles  from 
the  end  of  your  nose  the  way  you  were  look 
ing  at  it.'" 

"  You  mean  to  say — "  began  the  lieuten 
ant,  as  the  doctor  paused  to  chalk  his  cue. 

"  Never  mind  what  I  mean  to  say,"  said 
the  doctor.  "  Reflect  upon  what  I  have 
said." 

"  But  the  man  and  the  telescope — what 
became  of  them  ?"  asked  the  lieutenant. 

"  I  was  about  to  tell  you  that.  The  old 
fellow  who  had  made  this  marvellous  glass, 
which  to  two  eyes  that  he  knew  of,  and  to 
only  two,  would  work  as  was  desired,  feel 
ing  that  he  was  about  to  die,  had  come  to 
me  to  offer  the  glass  for  sale  on  two  con- 


THE    SPECK    ON    THE    LENS  Iig 

siderations.  One  was  a  consideration  of 
$25.  The  other  was  that  I  would  leave  no 
stone  unturned  to  discover  a  possible  third 
person  younger  than  myself  with  an  eye 
similar  to  those  we  had,  to  whom  at  my 
death  the  glass  should  be  transmitted,  ex 
acting  from  him  the  promise  that  he  too 
would  see  that  it  was  passed  along  in  the 
same  manner  into  the  hands  of  posterity. 
I  was  also  to  acquaint  the  world  with  the 
story  of  the  glass  and  the  name  of  its  in 
ventor  to  the  fullest  extent  possible." 

"  And  you,  of  course,  accepted  ?" 

"  I  did,"  said  the  doctor;  "but  having  no 
money  in  my  pocket,  I  went  down  into  the 
house  to  borrow  it  of  my  wife,  and  upon  my 
return  to  the  roof,  found  no  trace  of  the 
glass,  the  old  man,  or  the  roof  either." 

"What!"  cried  the  lieutenant.  "Are  you 
crazy  ?" 

"  No,"  smiled  the  doctor.  "  Not  at  all. 
For  the  moment  I  reached  the  roof  of  the 
house,  I  opened  my  eyes,  and  found  myself 
still  swinging  in  the  hammock  under  the 
trees." 

"And  the  moral  ?"  queried  the  lieutenant. 


120  THE    SPECK    ON    THE    LENS 

"You  promised  a  moral,  or  I  should  not 
have  listened." 

"Always  have  money  in  your  pocket,"  re 
plied  the  doctor,  pocketing  the  last  ball,  and 
putting  up  his  cue.  "  Then  you  are  not  apt 
to  lose  great  bargains  such  as  I  lost  for  the 
want  of  $25." 

"  It's  a  good  idea,"  returned  the  lieuten 
ant.  "  And  you  live  up  to  it,  I  suppose  ?" 

"  I  do,"  returned  the  oculist,  tapping  his 
pocket  significantly.  "  Always  !" 

"  Then,"  said  the  lieutenant,  earnestly, 
"  I  wish  you'd  lend  me  a  tenner,  for  really, 
doctor,  I  have  gone  clean  broke." 


A   MIDNIGHT    VISITOR 

I  DO  not  assert  that  what  I  am  about  to 
relate  is  in  all  its  particulars  absolutely  true. 
Not,  understand  me,  that  it  is  not  true,  but 
I  do  not  feel  that  I  care  to  make  an  asser 
tion  that  is  more  than  likely  to  be  received 
by  a  sceptical  age  with  sneers  of  incredulity. 
I  will  content  myself  with  a  simple  narration 
of  the  events  of  that  evening,  the  memory 
of  which  is  so  indelibly  impressed  upon  my 
mind,  and  which,  were  I  able  to  do  so,  I 
should  forget  without  any  sentiments  of  re 
gret  whatsoever. 

The  affair  happened  on  the  night  before 
I  fell  ill  of  typhoid  fever,  and  is  about  the 
sole  remaining  remembrance  of  that  imme 
diate  period  left  to  me.  Briefly  the  story  is 
as  follows  : 

Notwithstanding  the  fact  that  I  was  over 
worked  in  the  practice  of  my  profession — it 


122  A    MIDNIGHT   VISITOR 

was  early  in  March,  and  I  was  preparing  my 
contributions  for  the  coming  Christmas  is 
sues  of  the  periodicals  for  which  I  write — 
I  had  accepted  the  highly  honorable  posi 
tion  of  Entertainment  Committeeman  at  one 
of  the  small  clubs  to  which  I  belonged.  I 
accepted  the  office,  supposing  that  the  duties 
connected  with  it  were  easy  of  performance, 
and  with  absolutely  no  notion  that  the  faith 
of  my  fellow-committeemen  in  my  judgment 
was  so  strong  that  they  would  ultimately 
manifest  a  desire  to  leave  the  whole  pro 
gramme  for  the  club's  diversion  in  my  hands. 
This,  however,  they  did;  and  when  the 
month  of  March  assumed  command  of  the 
calendar  I  found  myself  utterly  fagged  out 
and  at  my  wits'  end  to  know  what  style  of 
entertainment  to  provide  for  the  club  meet 
ing  to  be  held  on  the  evening  of  the  i5th 
of  that  month.  I  had  provided  already  an 
unusually  taking  variety  of  evenings,  of 
which  one  in  particular,  called  the  "  Mar 
tyrs'  Night,"  in  which  living  authors  writhed 
through  selections  from  their  own  works, 
while  an  inhuman  audience,  every  man  of 
whom  had  suffered  even  as  the  victims  then 


MARTYRS'  NIGHT  " 


A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR 


I2S 


suffered,  sat  on  tenscore  of  camp-stools  puff 
ing  the  smoke  of  twenty-five  score  of  free 
cigars  into  their  faces,  and  gloating  over 
their  misery,  was  extremely  successful,  and 
had  gained  for  me  among  my  professional 
brethren  the  enviable  title  of  "  Machiavelli 
Junior."  This  performance,  in  fact,  was  the 
one  now  uppermost  in  the  minds  of  the  club 
members,  having  been  the  most  recent  of 
the  series ;  and  it  had  been  prophesied  by 
many  men  whose  judgment  was  unassail 
able  that  no  man,  not  even  I,  could  ever 
conceive  of  anything  that  could  surpass  it. 
Disposed  at  first  to  question  the  accuracy 
of  a  prophecy  to  the  effect  that  I  was,  like 
most  others  of  my  kind,  possessed  of  limi 
tations,  I  came  finally  to  believe  that  per 
haps,  after  all,  these  male  Cassandras  with 
whom  I  was  thrown  were  right.  Indeed,  the 
more  I  racked  my  brains  to  think  of  some 
thing  better  than  the  "Martyrs'  Night," 
the  more  I  became  convinced  that  in  that 
achievement  I  had  reached  the  zenith  of 
my  powers.  The  thing  for  me  to  do  now 
was  to  hook  myself  securely  on  to  the  zenith 
and  stay  there.  But  how  to  do  it?  That 


126  A    MIDNIGHT   VISITOR 

was  the  question  which  drove  sleep  from  my 
eyes,  and  deprived  me  for  a  period  of  six 
weeks  of  my  reason,  my  hair  departing  im 
mediately  upon  the  restoration  thereof — a 
not  uncommon  after-symptom  of  typhoid. 

It  was  a  typical  March  night,  this  one 
upon  which  the  extraordinary  incident  about 
to  be  related  took  place.  It  was  the  kind 
of  night  that  novelists  use  when  they  are 
handling  a  mystery  that  in  the  abstract 
would  amount  to  nothing,  but  which  in  the 
concrete  of  a  bit  of  wild,  weird,  and  windy 
nocturnalism  sends  the  reader  into  hysterics. 
It  may  be — I  shall  not  attempt  to  deny  it — 
that  had  it  happened  upon  another  kind  of 
an  evening — a  soft,  mild,  balmy  June  even 
ing,  for  instance — my  own  experience  would 
have  seemed  less  worthy  of  preservation  in 
the  amber  of  publicity,  but  of  that  the  reader 
must  judge  for  himself.  The  fact  alone  re 
mains  that  upon  the  night  when  my  uncan 
ny  visitor  appeared,  the  weather  department 
was  apparently  engaged  in  getting  rid  of  its 
remnants.  There  was  a  large  percentage 
of  withering  blast  in  the  general  make-up 
of  the  evening ;  there  were  rain  and  snow, 


A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR  127 

which  alternated  in  pattering  upon  my  win 
dow-pane  and  whitening  the  apology  for  a 
wold  that  stands  three  blocks  from  my  flat 
on  Madison  Square ;  the  wind  whistled  as 
it  always  does  upon  occasions  of  this  sort, 
and  from  all  corners  of  my  apartment,  after 
the  usual  fashion,  there  seemed  to  come 
sounds  of  a  supernatural  order,  the  effect  of 
which  was  to  send  cold  chills  off  on  their 
regular  trips  up  and  down  the  spine  of  their 
victim — in  this  instance  myself.  I  wish  that 
at  the  time  the  hackneyed  quality  of  these 
sensations  had  appealed  to  me.  That  it  did 
not  do  so  was  shown  by  the  highly  nervous 
state  in  which  I  found  myself  as  my  clock 
struck  eleven.  If  I  could  only  have  realized 
at  that  hour  that  these  symptoms  were  the 
same  old  threadbare  premonitions  of  the  ap 
pearance  of  a  supernatural  being,  I  should 
have  left  the  house  and  gone  to  the  club, 
and  so  have  avoided  the  visitation  then  im 
minent.  Had  I  done  this,  I  should  doubt 
less  also  have  escaped  the  typhoid,  since  the 
doctors  attributed  that  misfortune  to  the 
shock  of  my  experience,  which,  in  my  then 
wearied  state,  I  was  unable  to  sustain — 


128  A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR 

and  what  the  escape  of  typhoid  would  have 
meant  to  me  only  those  who  have  seen  the 
bills  of  my  physician  and  druggist  for  ser 
vices  rendered  and  prescriptions  compound 
ed  are  aware.  That  my  mind  unconsciously 
took  thought  of  spirits  was  shown  by  the 
fact  that  when  the  first  chill  came  upon  me  I 
arose  and  poured  out  for  myself  a  stiff  bum 
per  of  old  Reserve  Rye,  which  I  immediately 
swallowed  ;  but  beyond  this  I  did  not  go.  I 
simply  sat  there  before  my  fire  and  cud 
gelled  my  brains  for  an  idea  whereby  my 
fellow-members  at  the  Gutenberg  Club  might 
be  amused.  How  long  I  sat  there  I  do  not 
know.  It  may  have  been  ten  minutes;  it 
may  have  been  an  hour — I  was  barely  con 
scious  of  the  passing  of  time  —  but  I  do 
know  that  the  clock  in  the  Dutch  Reformed 
Church  steeple  at  Twenty-ninth  Street  and 
Fifth  Avenue  was  clanging  out  the  first 
stroke  of  the  hour  of  midnight  when  my 
door-bell  rang. 

Theretofore — if  I  may  be  allowed  the  word 
— the  tintinnabulation  of  my  door-bell  had 
been  invariably  pleasing  unto  me.  I  am 
fond  of  company,  and  company  alone  was 


A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR  1 29 

betokened  by  its  ringing,  since  my  credit 
ors  gratify  their  passion  for  interviews  at 
my  office,  if  perchance  they  happen  to  find 
me  there.  But  on  this  occasion — I  could 
not  at  the  moment  tell  why — its  clanging 
seemed  the  very  essence  of  discord.  It 
jangled  with  my  nervous  system,  and  as  it 
ceased  I  was  conscious  of  a  feeling  of  irri 
tability  which  is  utterly  at  variance  with  my 
nature  outside  of  business  hours.  In  the 
office,  for  the  sake  of  discipline,  I  frequent 
ly  adopt  a  querulous  manner,  finding  it  nec 
essary  in  dealing  with  office-boys,  but  the 
moment  I  leave  shop  behind  me  I  become 
a  different  individual  entirely,  and  have 
been  called  a  moteless  sunbeam  by  those 
who  have  seen  only  that  side  of  my  char 
acter.  This,  by-the-way,  must  be  regarded 
as  a  confidential  communication,  since  I 
am  at  present  engaged  in  preparing  a  vest- 
pocket  edition  of  the  philosophical  works 
of  Schopenhauer  in  words  of  one  syllable, 
and  were  it  known  that  the  publisher  had 
intrusted  the  magnificent  pessimism  of  that 
illustrious  juggler  of  words  and  theories  to 
a  "  moteless  sunbeam  "  it  might  seriously 


130  A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR 

interfere  with  the  sale  of  the  work ;  and  i 
may  say,  too,  that  this  request  that  my  con 
fidence  be  respected  is  entirely  disinterest 
ed,  inasmuch  as  I  declined  to  do  the  work 
on  the  royalty  plan,  insisting  upon  the  pay 
ment  of  a  lump  sum,  considerably  in  ad 
vance. 

But  to  return.  I  heard  the  bell  ring  with 
a  sense  of  profound  disgust.  I  did  not  wish 
to  see  anybody.  My  whiskey  was  low,  my 
quinine  pills  few  in  number;  my  chills  alone 
were  present  in  a  profusion  bordering  upon 
ostentation. 

"  I'll  pretend  not  to  hear  it,"  I  said  to 
myself,  resuming  my  work  of  gazing  at  the 
flickering  light  of  my  fire  —  which,  by-the- 
way,  was  the  only  light  in  the  room. 

"Ting-a-ling-a-ling  "  went  the  bell,  as  if 
in  answer  to  my  resolve. 

"  Confound  the  luck !"  I  cried,  jumping 
from  my  chair  and  going  to  the  door  with 
the  intention  of  opening  it,  an  intention 
however  which  was  speedily  abandoned,  for 
as  I  approached  it  a  sickly  fear  came  over 
me — a  sensation  I  had  never  before  known 
seemed  to  take  hold  of  my  being,  and  in- 


DO  YOU   HEAR   THAT   BOLT   SLIDE  ?" 


A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR  133 

stead  of  opening  the  door,  I  pushed  the 
bolt  to  make  it  the  more  secure. 

"There's  a  hint  for  you,  whoever  you 
are!"  I  cried.  "Do  you  hear  that  bolt 
slide,  you  ?"  I  added,  tremulously,  for  from 
the  other  side  there  came  no  reply — only  a 
more  violent  ringing  of  the  bell. 

"  See  here !"  I  called  out,  as  loudly  as  I 
could,  "who  are  you,  anyhow  What  do  you 
want  ?" 

There  was  no  answer,  except  from  the 
bell,  which  began  again. 

"  Bell-wire's  too  cheap  to  steal !"  I  called 
again.  "  If  you  want  wire,  go  buy  it ;  don't 
try  to  pull  mine  out.  It  isn't  mine,  any 
how.  It  belongs  to  the  house." 

Still  there  was  no  reply,  only  the  clanging 
of  the  bell ;  and  then  my  curiosity  overcame 
my  fear,  and  with  a  quick  movement  I  threw 
open  the  door. 

"  Are  you  satisfied  now  ?"  I  said,  angrfly. 
But  I  addressed  an  empty  vestibule.  There 
was  absolutely  no  one  there,  and  then  I  sat 
down  on  the  mat  and  laughed.  I  never  was 
so  glad  to  see  no  one  in  my  life.  But  my 
laugh  was  short-lived. 


134  A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR 

"  What  made  that  bell  ring  ?"  I  suddenly 
asked  myself,  and  then  the  feeling  of  fear 
came  upon  me  again.  I  gathered  my  some 
what  shattered  self  together,  sprang  to  my 
feet,  slammed  the  door  with  such  force  that 
the  corridors  echoed  to  the  sound,  slid  the 
bolt  once  more,  turned  the  key,  moved  a 
heavy  chair  in  front  of  it,  and  then  fled  like 
a  frightened  hare  to  the  sideboard  in  my  din 
ing-room.  There  I  grasped  the  decanter 
holding  my  whiskey,  seized  a  glass  from  the 
shelf,  and  started  to  pour  out  the  usual  dram, 
when  the  glass  fell  from  my  hand,  and  was 
shivered  into  a  thousand  pieces  on  the  hard 
wood  floor ;  for,  as  I  poured,  I  glanced 
through  the  open  door,  and  there  in  my 
sanctum  the  flicker  of  a  random  flame  di 
vulged  the  form  of  a  being,  the  eyes  of  whom 
seemed  fixed  on  mine,  piercing  me  through 
and  through.  To  say  that  I  was  petrified 
bvft  dimly  expresses  the  situation.  I  was 
granitized,  and  so  I  remained,  until  by  a 
more  luminous  flicker  from  the  burning 
wood  I  perceived  that  the  being  wore  a 
flaring  red  necktie. 

"  He  is  human,"  I  thought;  and  with  the 


THE   VISITOR    ARRIVES 


A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR  137 

thought  the  tension  on  my  nervous  system 
relaxed,  and  I  was  able  to  feel  a  sufficiently 
well-developed  sense  of  indignation  to  de 
mand  an  explanation.  "This  is  a  mighty 
cool  proceeding  on  your  part,"  I  said,  leav 
ing  the  sideboard  and  walking  into  the 
sanctum. 

"  Yes,"  he  replied,  in  a  tone  that  made  me 
jump,  it  was  so  extremely  sepulchral — a  tone 
that  seemed  as  if  it  might  have  been  ac 
quired  in  a  damp  corner  of  some  cave  off 
the  earth.  "  But  it's  a  cool  evening." 

"  I  wonder  that  a  man  of  your  coolness 
doesn't  hire  himself  out  to  some  refrigerat 
ing  company,"  I  remarked,  with  a  sneer 
which  would  have  delighted  the  soul  of  Cas- 
sius  himself. 

"  I  have  thought  of  it,"  returned  the  be 
ing,  calmly.  "  But  never  went  any  further. 
Summer-hotel  proprietors  have  always  out 
bid  the  refrigerating  people,  and  they  in  turn 
have  been  laid  low  by  millionaires,  who  have 
hired  me  on  occasion  to  freeze  out  people 
they  didn't  like,  but  who  have  persisted  in 
calling.  I  must  confess,  though,  my  dear 
Hiram,  that  you  are  not  much  warmer  your- 


138  A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR 

self  —  this  greeting  is  hardly  what  I  ex 
pected." 

"  Well,  if  you  want  to  make  me  warmer," 
I  retorted,  hotly,  "just  keep  on  calling  me 
Hiram.  How  the  deuce  did  you  know  of 
that  blot  on  my  escutcheon,  anyhow  ?"  I 
added,  for  Hiram  was  one  of  the  crimes  of 
my  family  that  I  had  tried  to  conceal,  my 
parents  having  fastened  the  name  of  Hiram 
Spencer  Carrington  upon  me  at  baptism  for 
no  reason  other  than  that  my  rich  bachelor 
uncle,  who  subsequently  failed  and  became 
a  charge  upon  me,  was  so  named. 

"  I  was  standing  at  the  door  of  the  church 
when  you  were  baptized,"  returned  the  vis 
itor,  "  and  as  you  were  an  interesting  baby, 
I  have  kept  an  eye  on  you  ever  since.  Of 
course  I  knew  that  you  discarded  Hiram  as 
soon  as  you  got  old  enough  to  put  away 
childish  things,  and  since  the  failure  of  your 
uncle  I  have  been  aware  that  you  desired  to 
be  known  as  Spencer  Carrington,  but  to  me 
you  are,  always  have  been,  and  always  will 
be,  Hiram." 

"  Well,  don't  give  it  away,"  I  pleaded.  "  I 
hope  to  be  famous  some  day,  and  if  the 


A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR  139 

American  newspaper  paragrapher  ever  got 
hold  of  the  fact  that  once  in  my  life  I  was 
Hiram,  I'd  have  to  Hiram  to  let  me  alone." 

"  That's  a  bad  joke,  Hiram,"  said  the  vis 
itor,  "  and  for  that  reason  I  like  it,  though  I 
don't  laugh.  There  is  no  danger  of  your 
becoming  famous  if  you  stick  to  humor  of 
that  sort." 

"Well,  I'd  like  to  know,"  I  put  in,  my 
anger  returning — "  I'd  like  to  know  who  in 
Brindisi  you  are,  what  in  Cairo  you  want, 
and  what  in  the  name  of  the  seventeen 
hinges  of  the  gates  of  Singapore  you  are 
doing  here  at  this  time  of  night  ?" 

"  When  you  were  a  baby,  Hiram,  you  had 
blue  eyes,"  said  my  visitor.  "  Bonny  blue 
eyes,  as  the  poet  says." 

"  What  of  it  ?"  I  asked. 

"This,"  replied  my  visitor.  "  If  you  have 
them  now,  you  can  very  easily  see  what  I  am 
doing  here.  I  am  sitting  down  and  talking 
to  you.'1'1 

"  Oh,  are  you  ?"  I  said,  with  fine  scorn. 
"  I  had  not  observed  that.  The  fact  is,  my 
eyes  were  so  weakened  by  the  brilliance  of 
that  necktie  of  yours  that  I  doubt  I  could 


140  A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR 

see  anything — not  even  one  of  my  own  jokes. 
It's  a  scorcher,  that  tie  of  yours.  In  fact,  I 
never  saw  anything  so  red  in  my  life." 

"  I  do  not  see  why  you  complain  of  my 
tie,"  said  the  visitor.  "  Your  own  is  just  as 
bad." 

"  Blue  is  never  so  withering  as  red,"  I  re 
torted,  at  the  same  time  caressing  the  scarf 
I  wore. 

"  Perhaps  not — but — ah — if  you  will  look 
in  the  glass,  Hiram,  you  will  observe  that 
your  point  is  not  well  taken,"  said  my  vis-a 
vis,  calmly. 

I  acted  upon  the  suggestion,  and  looked 
upon  my  reflection  in  the  glass,  lighting  a 
match  to  facilitate  the  operation.  I  was 
horrified  to  observe  that  my  beautiful  blue 
tie,  of  which  I  was  so  proud,  had  in  some 
manner  changed,  and  was  now  of  the  same 
aggressive  hue  as  was  that  of  my  visitor,  red 
even  as  a  brick  is  red.  To  grasp  it  firmly  in 
my  hands  and  tear  it  from  my  neck  was  the 
work  of  a  moment,  and  then  in  a  spirit  of 
rage  I  turned  upon  my  companion. 

"See  here,"  I  cried,  "I've  had  quite 
enough  of  you.  I  can't  make  you  out,  and 


I  LOOKED  UPON   MY  REFLECTION  IN   THE   GLASS 


A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR  143 

I  can't  say  that  I  want  to.  You  know  where 
the  door  is — you  will  oblige  me  by  putting  it 
to  its  proper  use." 

"  Sit  down,  Hiram,"  said  he,  "  and  don't 
be  foolish  and  ungrateful.  You  are  behav 
ing  in  a  most  extraordinary  fashion,  destroy 
ing  your  clothing  and  acting  like  a  madman 
generally.  What  was  the  use  of  ripping  up 
a  handsome  tie  like  that  ?" 

"  I  despise  loud  hues.  Red  is  a  jockey's 
color,"  I  answered. 

"  But  you  did  not  destroy  the  red  tie," 
said  he,  with  a  smile.  "  You  tore  up  your 
blue  one — look.  There  it  is  on  the  floor. 
The  red  one  you  still  have  on." 

Investigation  showed  the  truth  of  my  vis 
itor's  assertion.  That  flaunting  streamer  of 
anarchy  still  made  my  neck  infamous,  and 
before  me  on  the  floor,  an  almost  unrecog 
nizable  mass  of  shreds,  lay  my  cherished 
cerulean  tie.  The  revelation  stunned  me  ; 
tears  came  into  my  eyes,  and  trickling  down 
over  my  cheeks,  fairly  hissed  with  the  fever 
ish  heat  of  my  flesh.  My  muscles  relaxed, 
and  I  fell  limp  into  my  chair. 

"  You  need  stimulant,"  said   my  visitor, 


144  A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR 

kindly.  "  Go  take  a  drop  of  your  Old  Re 
serve,  and  then  come  back  here  to  me.  I've 
something  to  say  to  you." 

"Will  you  join  me?"  I  asked,  faintly. 

"  No,"  returned  the  visitor.  "  I  am  so 
fond  of  whiskey  that  I  never  molest  it.  That 
act  which  is  your  stimulant  is  death  to  the 
rye.  Never  realized  that,  did  you  ?" 

"  No,  I  never  did,"  I  said,  meekly. 

"  And  yet  you  claim  to  love  it.  Bah  !"  he 
said. 

And  then  I  obeyed  his  command,  drained 
my  glass  to  the  dregs,  and  returned.  "  What 
is  your  mission  ?"  I  asked,  when  I  had  made 
myself  as  comfortable  as  was  possible  under 
the  circumstances. 

"  To  relieve  you  of  your  woes,"  he  said. 

"  You  are  a  homoeopath,  I  observe,"  said 
I,  with  a  sneer.  "  You  are  a  homoeopath  in 
theory  and  an  allopath  in  practice." 

"  I  am  not  usually  unintelligent,"  said  he. 
"  I  fail  to  comprehend  your  meaning.  Per 
haps  you  express  yourself  badly." 

"  I  wish  you'd  express  yourself  for  Zulu- 
land,"  I  retorted,  hotly.  "What  I  mean  is, 
you  believe  in  the  similia  similibus  business, 


THE    RED    TIE 


A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR  147 

but  you  prescribe  large  doses.  I  don't  be 
lieve  troubles  like  mine  can  be  cured  on 
your  plan.  A  man  can't  get  rid  of  his  stock 
by  adding  to  it." 

"Ah,  I  see.  You  think  I  have  added  to 
your  troubles  ?" 

"  I  don't  think  so,''  I  answered,  with  a 
fond  glance  at  my  ruined  tie.  "  I  know  so." 

"  Well,  wait  until  I  have  laid  my  plan  be 
fore  you,  and  see  if  you  won't  change  your 
mind,"  said  my  visitor,  significantly. 

"All  right,"  I  said.  "Proceed.  Only 
hurry.  I  go  to  bed  early,  as  a  rule,  and  it's 
getting  quite  early  now." 

"  It's  only  one  o'clock,"  said  the  visitor, 
ignoring  the  sarcasm.  "  But  I  will  hasten, 
as  I've  several  other  calls  to  make  before 
breakfast." 

"  Are  you  a  milkman  ?"  I  asked. 

"You  are  flippant,"  he  replied.  "But, 
Hiram,"  he  added,  "  I  have  come  here  to 
aid  you  in  spite  of  your  unworthiness.  You 
want  to  know  what  to  provide  for  your  club 
night  on  the  i5th.  You  want  something 
that  will  knock  the  'Martyr's  Night'  silly." 

"  Not  exactly  that,"  I  replied.     "  I  don't 


148  A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR 

want  anything  so  abominably  good  as  to 
make  all  the  other  things  I  have  done  seem 
failures.  That  is  not  good  business." 

"  Would  you  like  to  be  hailed  as  the  dis 
coverer  of  genius?  Would  you  like  to  be 
the  responsible  agent  for  the  greatest  ex 
hibition  of  skill  in  a  certain  direction  ever 
seen  ?  Would  you  like  to  become  the  most 
famous  impresario  the  world  has  ever 
known  ?" 

"Now,"  I  said,  forgetting  my  dignity 
under  the  enthusiasm  with  which  I  was  in 
spired  by  my  visitor's  words,  and  infected 
more  or  less  with  his  undoubtedly  magnetic 
spirit — "  now  you're  shouting." 

"  I  thought  so,  Hiram.  I  thought  so,  and 
that's  why  I  am  here.  I  saw  you  on  Wall 
Street  to-day,  and  read  your  difficulty  at 
once  in  your  eyes,  and  I  resolved  to  help 
you.  I  am  a  magician,  and  one  or  two  little 
things  have  happened  of  late  to  make  me 
wish  to  prestidigitate  in  public.  I  knew  you 
were  after  a  show  of  some  kind,  and  I've 
come  to  offer  you  my  services." 

"  Oh,  pshaw  !"  I  said.  "  The  members  of 
the  Gutenberg  Club  are  men  of  brains — not 


"  NOT   A    CARD    FELL " 


A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR 


children.  Card  tricks  are  hackneyed,  and 
sleight-of-hand  shows  pall." 

"Do  they,  indeed?"  said  the  visitor. 
"  Well,  mine  won't  If  you  don't  believe  it, 
I'll  prove  to  you  what  I  can  do." 

"  I  have  no  paraphernalia,"  I  said. 

"Well,  I  have,"  said  he,  and  as  he  spoke, 
a  pack  of  cards  seemed  to  grow  out  of  my 
hands.  I  must  have  turned  pale  at  this  un 
expected  happening,  for  my  visitor  smiled, 
and  said  : 

"Don't  be  frightened.  That's  only  one 
of  my  tricks.  Now  choose  a  card,"  he  added, 
"  and  when  you  have  done  so,  toss  the  pack 
in  the  air.  Don't  tell  me  what  the  card  is  ; 
it  alone  will  fall  to  the  floor." 

"  Nonsense  !"  said  I.     "  It's  impossible." 

"  Do  as  I  tell  you." 

I  did  as  he  told  me,  to  a  degree  only.  I 
tossed  the  cards  in  the  air  without  choosing 
one,  although  I  made  a  feint  of  doing  so. 

Not  a  card  fell  back  to  the  floor.  They 
every  one  disappeared  from  view  in  the  ceil 
ing.  If  it  had  not  been  for  the  heavy  chair 
I  had  rolled  in  front  of  the  door,  I  think  I 
should  have  fled. 


152  A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR 

"  How's  that  for  a  trick  ?"  asked  my  vis 
itor. 

I  said  nothing,  for  the  very  good  reason 
that  my  words  stuck  in  my  throat. 

"Give  me  a  .little  creme  de  menthe,  will 
you,  please  ?"  said  he,  after  a  moment's 
pause. 

"  I  haven't  a  drop  in  the  house,"  I  said, 
relieved  to  think  that  this  wonderful  being 
could  come  down  to  anything  so  earthly. 

"  Pshaw,  Hiram  !"  he  ejaculated,  appar 
ently  in  disgust.  "  Don't  be  mean,  and, 
above  all,  dcin't  lie.  Why,  man,  you've  got 
a  bottle  full  of  it  in  your  hand  !  Do  you 
want  it  all  ?" 

He  was  right.  Where  it  came  from  I  do  not 
know ;  but,  beyond  question,  the  graceful, 
slim-necked  bottle  was  in  my  right  hand,  and 
my  left  held  a  liqueur-glass  of  exquisite  form. 

"  Say,"  I  gasped,  as  soon  as  I  was  able  to 
collect  my  thoughts,  "  what  are  your  terms  ?"' 

"  Wait  a  moment,"  he  answered.  "  Let 
me  do  a  little  mind-reading  before  we  ar 
range  preliminaries." 

"I  haven't  much  of  a  mind  to  read  to 
night,"  I  answered,  wildly. 


A    MIDNIGHT   VISITOR  155 

"  You're  right  there,"  said  he.  "  It's  like 
a  dime  novel,  that  mind  of  yours  to-night. 
But  I'll  do  the  best  I  can  with  it.  Suppose 
you  think  of  your  favorite  poem,  and  after 
turning  it  over  in  your  mind  carefully  for  a 
few  minutes,  select  two  lines  from  it,  con 
cealing  them,  of  course,  from  me,  and  I  will 
tell  you  what  they  are." 

Now  my  favorite  poem,  I  regret  to  say,  is 
Lewis  Carroll's  "  Jabberwock,"  a  fact  I  was 
ashamed  to  confess  to  an  utter  stranger,  so 
I  tried  to  deceive  him  by  thinking  of  some 
other  lines.  The  effort  was  hardly  success 
ful,  for  the  only  other  lines  I  could  call  to 
mind  at  the  moment  were  from  Rudyard 
Kipling's  rhyme,  "The  Post  that  Fitted," 
and  which  ran, 

"Year  by  year,  in  pious  patience,  vengeful   Mrs. 

Boffin  sits 

Waiting  for  the  Sleary  babies  to  develop  Sleary's 
fits." 

"  Humph !"  ejaculated  my  visitor.  "  You're 
a  great  Hiram,  you  are." 

And  then  rising  from  his  chair  and  walk 
ing  to  my  "poet's  corner,"  the  magician  se 
lected  two  volumes. 


156  A    MIDNIGHT    VISITOR 

"  There,"  said  he,  handing  me  the  Depart 
mental  Ditties.  "You'll  find  the  lines  you 
tried  to  fool  me  with  at  the  foot  of  page 
thirteen.  Look." 

I  looked,  and  there  lay  that  vile  Sleary 
sentiment,  in  all  the  majesty  of  type,  staring 
me  in  the  eyes. 

"And  here,"  added  my  visitor,  opening 
Alice  in  the  Looking- Glass — "here  is  the 
poem  that  to  your  mind  holds  all  the  philos 
ophy  of  life : 

' '  '  Come  to  my  arms,  my  beamish  boy, 
He  chortled  in  his  joy.'" 

I  blushed  and  trembled.  Blushed  that 
he  should  discover  the  weakness  of  my 
taste,  trembled  at  his  power. 

"  I  don't  blame  you  for  coloring,"  said 
the  magician.  "  But  I  thought  you  said 
the  Gutenberg  was  made  up  of  men  of 
brains  ?  Do  you  think  you  could  stay  on 
the  rolls  a  month  if  they  were  aware  that 
your  poetic  ideals  are  summed  up  in  the 
'Jabberwock'  and  '  Sleary's  Fits'?" 

"  My  taste  might  be  far  worse,"  I  an 
swered. 


I   MUST   HAVE   FAINTED 


A   MIDNIGHT   VISITOR  159 

"Yes,  it  might.  You  might  have  stooped 
to  liking  some  of  your  own  verses.  I  ought 
really  to  congratulate  you,  I  suppose,"  re 
torted  the  visitor,  with  a  sneering  laugh. 

This  roused  my  ire  again. 

"Who  are  you,  anyhow,  that  you  come 
here  and  take  me  to  task  ?"  I  demanded, 
angrily.  "  I'll  like  anything  I  please,  and 
without  asking  your  permission.  If  I  cared 
more  for  the  Peterkin  Papers  than  I  do  for 
Shakespeare,  I  wouldn't  be  accountable  to 
you,  and  that's  all  there  is  about  it." 

"  Never  mind  who  I  am,"  said  the  visitor. 
"Suffice  to  say  that  I  am  myself.  You'll 
know  my  name  soon  enough.  In  fact,  you 
will  pronounce  it  involuntarily  the  first 
thing  when  you  wake  in  the  morning,  and 
then — "  Here  he  shook  his  head  ominous 
ly,  and  I  felt  myself  grow  rigid  with  fright 
in  my  chair.  "  Now  for  the  final  trick,"  he 
said,  after  a  moment's  pause.  "Think  of 
where  you  would  most  like  to  be  at  this 
moment,  and  I'll  exert  my  power  to  put 
you  there.  Only  close  your  eyes  first." 

I  closed  my  eyes  and  wished.  When  I 
opened  them  I  was  in  the  billiard-room  of 


160  A    MIDNIGHT   VISITOR 

the    Gutenberg    Club    with    Perkins    and 
Tompson. 

"  For  Heaven's  sake,  Spencer,"  they  said, 
in  surprise,  "  where  did  you  drop  in  from  ? 
Why,  man,  you  are  as  white  as  a  sheet. 
And  what  a  necktie  !  Take  it  off !" 

"Grab  hold  of  me,  boys,  and  hold  me 
fast,"  I  pleaded,  falling  on  my  knees  in  ter 
ror.  "  If  you  don't,  I  believe  I'll  die." 

The  idea  of  returning  to  my  sanctum  was 
intolerably  dreadful  to  me. 

"  Ha !  ha !"  laughed  the  magician,  for 
even  as  I  spoke  to  Perkins  and  Tompson  I 
found  myself  seated  opposite  my  infernal 
visitor  in  my  room  once  more.  "  They 
couldn't  keep  you  an  instant  with  me  sum 
moning  you  back." 

His  laughter  was  terrible  ;  his  frown  was 
pleasanter ;  and  I  felt  myself  gradually  los 
ing  control  of  my  senses. 

"  Go,"  I  cried.  "  Leave  me,  or  you  will 
have  the  crime  of  murder  on  your  con 
science." 

"  I  have  no  con — "  he  began  ;  but  I  heard 
no  more. 

That  is  the  last  I  remember  of  that  fear- 


THE   MIND-READING   FEATS  ON  THE   CLUB'S   BUTLER 


A    MIDNIGHT   VISITOR  163 

ful  night.  I  must  have  fainted,  and  then 
have  fallen  into  a  deep  slumber. 

When  I  waked  it  was  morning,  and  I  was 
alone,  but  undressed  and  in  bed,  uncon 
scionably  weak,  and  surrounded  by  medi 
cine  bottles  of  many  kinds.  The  clock  on 
the  mantle  on  the  other  side  of  the  room 
indicated  that  it  was  after  ten  o'clock. 

"Great  Beelzebub!"  I  cried,  taking  note 
of  the  hour.  "  I've  an  engagement  with 
Barlow  at  nine." 

And  then  a  sweet-faced  woman,  who,  I 
afterwards  learned,  was  a  professional  nurse, 
entered  the  room,  and  within  an  hour  I  real 
ized  two  facts.  One  was  that  I  had  lain  ill 
for  many  days,  and  that  my  engagement 
with  Barlow  was  now  for  six  weeks  unful 
filled  ;  the  other,  that  my  midnight  visitor 
was  none  other  than — 

And  yet  I  don't  know.  His  tricks  cer 
tainly  were^  worthy  of  that  individual ;  but 
Perkins  and  Tompson  assert  that  I  never 
entered  the  club  that  night,  and  surely  if 
my  visitor  was  Beelzebub  himself  he  would 
not  have  omitted  so  important  a  factor  of 
success  as  my  actual  presence  in  the  billiard- 


164  A    MIDNIGHT   VISITOR 

room  on  that  occasion  would  have  been  ; 
and,  besides,  he  was  altogether  too  cool  to 
have  come  from  his  reputed  residence. 

Altogether  I  think  the  episode  most  un 
accountable,  particularly  when  I  reflect  that 
while  no  trace  of  my  visitor  was  discover 
able  in  my  room  the  next  morning,  as  my 
nurse  tells  me,  my  blue  necktie  was  in  real 
ity  found  upon  the  floor,  crushed  and  torn 
into  a  shapeless  bundle  of  frayed  rags. 

As  for  the  club  entertainment,  I  am  told 
that,  despite  my  absence,  it  was  a  wonderful 
success,  redeemed  from  failure,  the  treasurer 
of  the  club  said,  by  the  voluntary  services 
of  a  guest,  who  secured  admittance  on  one 
of  my  cards,  and  who  executed  some  sleight- 
of-hand  tricks  that  made  the  members  trem 
ble,  and  whose  mind-reading  feats  performed 
on  the  club's  butler  not  only  made  it  neces 
sary  for  him  to  resign  his  office,  but  disclosed 
to  the  House  Committee  the  whereabouts 
of  several  cases  of  rare  wines  that  had  mys 
teriously  disappeared. 


A   QUICKSILVER  CASSANDRA 

IT  was  altogether  queer,  and  Jingleberry 
to  this  day  does  not  entirely  understand  it. 
He  had  examined  his  heart  as  carefully  as 
he  knew  how,  and  had  arrived  at  the  en 
tirely  reasonable  conclusion  that  he  was  in 
love.  He  had  every  symptom  of  that  mal 
ady.  When  Miss  Marian  Chapman  was 
within  range  of  his  vision  there  was  room 
for  no  one  else  there.  He  suffered  from 
that  peculiar  optical  condition  which  en 
abled  him  to  see  but  one  thing  at  a  time 
when  she  was  present,  and  she  was  that  one 
thing,  which  was  probably  the  reason  why 
in  his  mind's  eye  she  was  the  only  woman 
in  the  world,  for  Marian  was  ever  present 
before  Jingleberry's  mental  optic.  He  had 
also  examined  as  thoroughly  as  he  could  in 
hypothesis  the  heart  of  this  "only  woman," 
and  he  had  —  or  thought  he  had,  which 
amounts  to  the  same  thing— reason  to  be- 


166  A    QUICKSILVER    CASSANDRA 

lieve  that  she  reciprocated  his  affection. 
She  certainly  seemed  glad  always  when  he 
was  about ;  she  called  him  by  his  first  name, 
and  sometimes  quarrelled  with  him  as  she 
quarrelled  with  no  one  else,  and  if  that 
wasn't  a  sign  of  love  in  woman,  then  Jingle- 
berry  had  studied  the  sex  all  his  years — 
and  they  were  thirty-two — for  nothing.  In 
short,  Marian  behaved  so  like  a  sister  to 
him  that  Jingleberry,  knowing  how  dreams 
and  women  go  by  contraries,  was  absolutely 
sure  that  a  sister  was  just  the  reverse  from 
that  relationship  which  in  her  heart  of  hearts 
she  was  willing  to  assume  towards  him,  and 
he  was  happy  in  consequence.  Believing 
this,  it  was  not  at  all  strange  that  he  should 
make  up  his  mind  to  propose  marriage  to 
her,  though,  like  many  other  men,  he  was 
somewhat  chicken-hearted  in  coming  to  the 
point.  Four  times  had  he  called  upon  Ma 
rian  for  the  sole  purpose  of  asking  her  to 
become  his  wife,  and  four  times  had  he 
led  up  to  the  point  and  then  talked  about 
something  else.  What  quality  it  is  in  man 
that  makes  a  coward  of  him  in  the  presence 
of  one  he  considers  his  dearest  friend  is  not 


A    QUICKSILVER    CASSANDRA  167 

within  the  province  of  this  narrative  to  de 
termine,  but  Jingleberry  had  it  in  its  most 
virulent  form.  He  had  often  got  so  far 
along  in  his  proposal  as  "  Marian — er — will 
you — will  you — ,"  and  there  he  had  as  often 
stopped,  contenting  himself  with  such  com 
mon-place  conclusions  as  "go  to  the  matinee 
with  me  to-morrow  ?"  or  "  ask  your  father  for 
me  if  he  thinks  the  stock  market  is  likely  to 
strengthen  soon  ?"  and  other  amazing  sub 
stitutes  for  the  words  he  so  ardently  desired, 
yet  feared,  to  utter.  But  this  afternoon — 
the  one  upon  which  the  extraordinary  events 
about  to  be  narrated  took  place  —  Jingle- 
berry  had  called  resolved  not  to  be  balked 
in  his  determination  to  learn  his  fate.  He 
had  come  to  propose,  and  propose  he  would, 
ruat  coelum.  His  confidence  in  a  successful 
termination  to  his  suit  had  been  reinforced 
that  very  morning  by  the  receipt  of  a  note 
from  Miss  Chapman  asking  him  to  dine 
with  her  parents  and  herself  that  evening, 
and  to  accompany  them  after  dinner  to  the 
opera.  Surely  that  meant  a  great  deal,  and 
Jingleberry  conceived  that  the  time  was 
ripe  for  a  blushing  "yes"  to  his  long- 


1 68  A    QUICKSILVER    CASSANDRA 

deferred  question.  So  he  was  here  in  the 
Chapman  parlor  waiting  for  the  young  lady 
to  come  down  and  become  the  recipient 
of  the  "interesting  interrogatory,"  as  it  is 
called  in  some  sections  of  Massachusetts. 

"  I'll  ask  her  the  first  thing,"  said  Jingle- 
berry,  buttoning  up  his  Prince  Albert,  as 
though  to  impart  a  possibly  needed  stiffen 
ing  to  his  backbone.  "  She  will  say  yes, 
and  then  I  shall  enjoy  the  dinner  and  the 
opera  so  much  the  more.  Ahem  !  I  wonder 
if  I  am  pale — I  feel  sort  of — um —  There's 
a  mirror.  That  will  tell."  Jingleberry 
walked  to  the  mirror — an  oval,  gilt-framed 
mirror,  such  as  was  very  much  the  vogue  fifty 
years  ago,  for  which  reason  alone,  no  doubt, 
it  was  now  admitted  to  the  gold- and- white 
parlor  of  the  house  of  Chapman. 

"  Blessed  things  these  mirrors,"  said  Jin 
gleberry,  gazing  at  the  reflection  of  his  face. 
"  So  reassuring.  I'm  not  at  all  pale.  Quite 
the  contrary.  I'm  red  as  a  sunset.  Good 
omen  that !  The  sun  is  setting  on  my 
bachelor  days — and  my  scarf  is  crooked. 
Ah  !" 

The  ejaculation  was  one  of  pleasure,  for 


A    QUICKSILVER    CASSANDRA  169 

pictured  in  the  mirror  Jingleberry  saw  the 
form  of  Marian  entering  the  room  through 
the  portieres. 

"  How  do  you  do,  Marian  ?  been  admir 
ing  myself  in  the  glass,"  he  said,  turning  to 
greet  her.  "  I — er — " 

Here  he  stopped,  as  well  he  might,  for 
he  addressed  no  one.  Miss  Chapman  was 
nowhere  to  be  seen. 

"  Dear  me  !"  said  Jingleberry,  rubbing  his 
eyes  in  astonishment.  "  How  extraordinary! 
I  surely  thought  I  saw  her — why,  I  did  see 
her — that  is,  I  saw  her  reflection  in  the  gla — 
Ha  !  ha !  She  caught  me  gazing  at  myself 
there  and  has  hidden." 

He  walked  to  the  door  and  drew  the 
portiere  aside  and  looked  into  the  hall. 
There  was  no  one  there.  He  searched  every 
corner  of  the  hall  and  of  the  dining-room  at 
its  end,  and  then  returned  to  the  parlor,  but 
it  was  still  empty.  And  then  occurred  the 
most  strangely  unaccountable  event  in  his 
life. 

As  he  looked  about  the  parlor,  he  for  the 
second  time  found  himself  before  the  mir 
ror,  but  the  reflection  therein,  though  it  was 


170  A    QUICKSILVER    CASSANDRA 

of  himself,  was  of  himself  with  his  back 
turned  to  his  real  self,  as  he  stood  gazing 
amazedly  into  the  glass ;  and  besides  this, 
although  Jingleberry  was  alone  in  the  real 
parlor,  the  reflection  of  the  dainty  room 
showed  that  there  he  was  not  so,  for  seated 
in  her  accustomed  graceful  attitude  in  the 
reflected  arm-chair  was  nothing  less  than 
the  counterfeit  presentment  of  Marian  Chap 
man  herself. 

It  was  a  wonder  Jingleberry's  eyes  did 
not  fall  out  of  his  head,  he  stared  so.  What 
a  situation  it  was,  to  be  sure,  to  stand  there 
and  see  in  the  glass  a  scene  which,  as  far 
as  he  could  observe,  had  no  basis  in  reality; 
and  how  interesting  it  was  for  Jingleberry 
to  watch  himself  going  through  the  form  of 
chatting  pleasantly  there  in  the  mirror's 
depths  with  the  woman  he  loved  !  It  almost 
made  him  jealous,  though,  the  reflected 
Jingleberry  was  so  entirely  independent  of 
the  real  Jingleberry.  The  jealousy  soon 
gave  way  to  consternation,  for,  to  the  won 
dering  suitor,  the  independent  reflection  was 
beginning  to  do  that  for  which  he  himself 
had  come.  In  other  words,  there  was  a  pro- 


A    QUICKSILVER    CASSANDRA  171 

posal  going  on  there  in  the  glass,  and  Jingle- 
berry  enjoyed  the  novel  sensation  of  seeing 
how  he  himself  would  look  when  passing 
through  a  similar  ordeal.  Altogether,  how 
ever,  it  was  not  as  pleasing  as  most  novel 
ties  are,  for  there  were  distinct  signs  in  the 
face  of  the  mirrored  Marian  that  the  mir 
rored  Jingleberry's  words  were  distasteful 
to  her,  and  that  the  proposition  he  was 
making  was  not  one  she  could  entertain 
under  any  circumstances.  She  kept  shak 
ing  her  head,  and  the  more  she  shook  it, 
the  more  the  glazed  Jingleberry  seemed  to 
implore  her  to  be  his.  Penally,  Jingleberry 
saw  his  quicksilver  counterpart  fall  upon 
his  knees  before  Marian  of  the  glass,  and 
hold  out  his  arms  and  hands  towards  her  in 
an  attitude  of  prayerful  despair,  whereupon 
the  girl  sprang  to  her  feet,  stamped  her  left 
foot  furiously  upon  the  floor,  and  pointed 
the  unwelcome  lover  to  the  door. 

Jingleberry  was  fairly  staggered.  What 
could  be  the  meaning  of  so  extraordinary  a 
freak  of  nature  ?  Surely  it  must  be  pro 
phetic.  Fate  was  kind  enough  to  warn  him 
in  advance,  no  doubt ;  otherwise  it  was  a 


172  A    QUICKSILVER    CASSANDRA 

trick.  And  why  should  she  stoop  to  play 
so  paltry  a  trick  as  that  upon  him  ?  Surely 
fate  would  not  be  so  petty.  No.  It  was  a 
warning.  The  mirror  had  been  so  affected 
by  some  supernatural  agency  that  it  divined 
and  reflected  that  which  was  to  be  instead 
of  confining  itself  to  what  Jingleberry 
called  "simultaneity."  It  led  instead  of 
following  or  acting  coincidently  with  the 
reality,  and  it  was  the  part  of  wisdom,  he 
thought,  for  him  to  yield  to  its  suggestion 
and  retreat ;  and  as  he  thought  this,  he 
heard  a  soft  sweet  voice  behind  him. 

"  I  hope  you  haven't  got  tired  of  waiting, 
Tom,"  it  said;  and,  turning,  Jingleberry 
saw  the  unquestionably  real  Marian  stand 
ing  in  the  doorway. 

"  No,"  he  answered,  shortly.  "I — I  have 
had  a  pleasant— very  entertaining  ten  min 
utes  ;  but  I — I  must  hurry  along,  Marian," 
he  added.  "  I  only  came  to  tell  you  that  I 
have  a  frightful  headache,  and — er — I  can't 
very  well  manage  to  come  to  dinner  or  go 
to  the  opera  with  you  to-night." 

"Why,  Tom,"  pouted  Marian,  "I  am  aw 
fully  disappointed  !  I  had  counted  on  you, 


A    QUICKSILVER    CASSANDRA  173 

and  now  my  whole  evening  will  be  spoiled. 
Don't  you  think  you  can  rest  a  little  while, 
and  then  come  ?" 

"Well,  I — I  want  to,  Marian,"  said  Jin- 
gleberry ;  "but,  to  tell  the  truth,  I — I  really 
am  afraid  I  am  going  to  be  ill ;  I've  had 
such  a  strange  experience  this  afternoon. 
I—" 

"  Tell  me  what  it  was,"  suggested  Marian, 
sympathetically;  and  Jingleberry  did  tell 
her  what  it  was.  He  told  her  the  whole 
story  from  beginning  to  end — what  he  had 
come  for,  how  he  had  happened  to  look  in 
the  mirror,  and  what  he  saw  there ;  and 
Marian  listened  attentively  to  every  word 
he  said.  She  laughed  once  or  twice,  and 
when  he  had  done  she  reminded  him  that 
mirrors  have  a  habit  of  reversing  everything ; 
and  somehow  or  other  Jingleberry's  head 
ache  went,  and  —  and  —  well,  everything 
went ! 


THE   GHOST  CLUB 

AN  UNFORTUNATE  EPISODE  IN  THE 
LIFE  OF  NO.  5010 

NUMBER  5010  was  at  the  time  when  I  re 
ceived  the  details  of  this  story  from  his 
lips  a  stalwart  man  of  thirty-eight,  swart  of 
hue,  of  pleasing  address,  and  altogether  the 
last  person  one  would  take  for  a  convict 
serving  a  term  for  sneak -thieving.  The 
only  outer  symptoms  of  his  actual  condi 
tion  were  the  striped  suit  he  wore,  the  style 
and  cut  of  which  are  still  in  vogue  at  Sing 
Sing  prison,  and  the  closely  cropped  hair, 
which  showed  off  the  distinctly  intellectual 
lines  of  his  head  to  great  advantage.  He 
was  engaged  in  making  shoes  when  I  first 
saw  him,  and  so  impressed  was  I  with  the 
contrast  between  his  really  refined  features 
and  grace  of  manner  and  those  of  his  brut 
ish-looking  companions,  that  I  asked  my 


"Soio' 


THE   GHOST    CLUB  177 

guide  who  he  was,  and  what  were  the  cir 
cumstances  which  had  brought  him  to  Sing 
Sing. 

"  He  pegs  shoes  like  a  gentleman,"  I  said. 

"  Yes,"  returned  the  keeper.  "  He's 
werry  troublesome  that  way.  He  thinks 
he's  too  good  for  his  position.  We  can't 
never  do  nothing  with  the  boots  he  makes." 

"Why  do  you  keep  him  at  work  in  the 
shoe  department  ?"  1  queried. 

"  We  haven't  got  no  work  to  be  done  in 
his  special  line,  so  we  have  to  put  him  at 
whatever  we  can.  He  pegs  shoes  less  bad 
ly  than  he  does  anything  else." 

"What  was  his  special  line?" 

"He  was  a  gentleman  of  leisure  travellin' 
for  his  health  afore  he  got  into  the  toils  o' 
the  law.  His  real  name  is  Marmaduke 
Fitztappington  De  Wolfe,  of  Pelhamhurst- 
by- the -Sea,  Warwickshire.  He  landed  in 
this  country  of  a  Tuesday,  took  to  collectin' 
souvenir  spoons  of  a  Friday,  was  jugged 
the  same  day,  tried,  convicted,  and  there 
he  sets.  In  for  two  years  more." 

"  How  interesting  !"  I  said.  "  Was  the 
evidence  against  him  conclusive  ?" 


178  THE   GHOST   CLUB 

"Extremely.  A  half-dozen  spoons  was 
found  on  his  person." 

"  He  pleaded  guilty,  I  suppose  ?" 

"Not  him.  He  claimed  to  be  as  inno 
cent  as  a  new-born  babe.  Told  a  cock-and- 
bull  story  about  havin'  been  deluded  by 
spirits,  but  the  judge  and  jury  wasn't  to  be 
fooled.  They  gave  him  every  chance,  too. 
He  even  cabled  himself,  the  judge  did,  to 
Pelhamhurst-by- the- Sea,  Warwickshire,  at 
his  own  expense,  to  see  if  the  man  was  an 
impostor,  but  he  never  got  no  reply.  There 
was  them  as  said  there  wasn't  no  such  place 
as  Pelhamhurst-by-the-Sea  in  Warwickshire, 
but  they  never  proved  it." 

"  I  should  like  very  much  to  interview 
him,"  said  I. 

"  It  can't  be  done,  sir,"  said  my  guide. 
"The  rules  is  very  strict." 

"  You  couldn't — er — arrange  an  interview 
for  me,"  I  asked,  jingling  a  bunch  of  keys 
in  my  pocket. 

He  must  have  recognized  the  sound,  for 
he  colored  and  gruffly  replied,  "  I  has  me 
orders,  and  I  obeys  'em." 

"  Just — er — add  this  to  the  pension  fund," 


"  PEGGING   SHOES  LIKE   A   GENTLEMAN 


THE   GHOST   CLUB  l8l 

I  put  in,  handing  him  a  five-dollar  bill. 
"  An  interview  is  impossible,  eh  ?" 

"  I  didn't  say  impossible,"  he  answered, 
with  a  grateful  smile.  "  I  said  against  the 
rules,  but  we  has  been  known  to  make  ex 
ceptions.  I  think  I  can  fix  you  up." 

Suffice  it  to  say  that  he  did  "fix  me  up," 
and  that  two  hours  later  5010  and  I  sat 
down  together  in  the  cell  of  the  former,  a 
not  too  commodious  stall,  and  had  a  pleas 
ant  chat,  in  the  course  of  which  he  told  me 
the  story  of  his  life,  which,  as  I  had  sur 
mised,  was  to  me,  at  least,  exceedingly  in 
teresting,  and  easily  worth  twice  the  amount 
of  my  contribution  to  the  pension  fund  under 
the  management  of  my  guide  of  the  morning. 

"  My  real  name,"  said  the  unfortunate 
convict,  "  as  you  may  already  have  guessed, 
is  not  5010.  That  is  an  alias  forced  upon 
me  by  the  State  authorities.  My  name  is 
really  Austin  Merton  Surrennes." 

"  Ahem  !"  I  said.  "  Then  my  guide  erred 
this  morning  when  he  told  me  that  in  reali 
ty  you  were  Marmaduke  Fitztappington  De 
Wolfe,  of  Pelhamhurst-by-the-Sea,  Warwick 
shire?" 


l82  THE   GHOST   CLUB 

Number  5010  laughed  long  and  loud. 
"  Of  course  he  erred.  You  don't  suppose 
that  I  would  give  the  authorities  my  real 
name,  do  you  ?  Why,  man,  I  am  a  nephew  ! 
I  have  an  aged  uncle — a  rich  millionaire 
uncle — whose  heart  and  will  it  would  break 
were  he  to  hear  of  my  present  plight.  Both 
the  heart  and  will  are  in  my  favor,  hence 
my  tender  solicitude  for  him.  I  am  inno 
cent,  of  course — convicts  always  are,  you 
know — but  that  wouldn't  make  any  differ 
ence.  He'd  die  of  mortification  just  the 
same.  It's  one  of  our  family  traits,  that. 
So  I  gave  a  false  name  to  the  authorities, 
and  secretly  informed  my  uncle  that  I  was 
about  to  set  out  for  a  walking  trip  across 
the  great  American  desert,  requesting  him 
not  to  worry  if  he  did  not  hear  from  me 
for  a  number  of  years,  America  being  in  a 
state  of  semi -civilization,  to  which  mails 
outside  of  certain  districts  are  entirely  un 
known.  My  uncle  being  an  Englishman 
and  a  conservative  gentleman,  addicted 
more  to  reading  than  to  travel,  accepts  the 
information  as  veracious  and  suspects  noth 
ing,  and  when  I  am  liberated  I  shall  re- 


THE   GHOST   CLUB  183 

turn  to  him,  and  at  his  death  shall  become 
a  conservative  man  of  wealth  myself.  See?" 

"  But  if  you  are  innocent  and  he  rich  and 
influential,  why  did  you  not  appeal  to  him 
to  save  you  ?"  I  asked. 

"  Because  I  was  afraid  that  he,  like  the 
rest  of  the  world,  would  decline  to  believe 
my  defence,"  sighed  5010.  "  It  was  a  good 
defence,  if  the  judge  had  only  known  it,  and 
I'm  proud  of  it." 

"But  ineffectual,"  I  put  in.  "And  so, 
not  good." 

"Alas,  yes!  This  is  an  incredulous  age. 
People,  particularly  judges,  are  hard-headed 
practical  men  of  affairs.  My  defence  was 
suited  more  for  an  age  of  mystical  ten 
dencies.  Why,  will  you  believe  it,  sir,  my 
own  lawyer,  the  man  to  whom  I  paid  eigh 
teen  dollars  and  seventy  -  five  cents  for 
championing  my  cause,  told  me  the  defence 
was  rubbish,  devoid  even  of  literary  merit. 
What  chance  could  a  man  have  if  his  law 
yer  even  didn't  believe  in  him  ?" 

"None,"  I  answered,  sadly.  "And  you 
had  no  chance  at  all,  though  innocent  ?" 

"  Yes,  I  had  one,  and  I  chose  not  to  take 


184  THE   GHOST   CLUB 

it.  I  might  have  proved  myself  non  compos 
mentis ;  but  that  involved  my  making  a  fool 
of  myself  in  public  before  a  jury,  and  I 
have  too  much  dignity  for  that,  I  can  tell 
you.  I  told  my  lawyer  that  I  should  pre 
fer  a  felon's  cell  to  the  richly  furnished  flat 
of  a  wealthy  lunatic,  to  which  he  replied, 
'  Then  all  is  lost !'  And  so  it  was.  I  read 
my  defence  in  court.  The  judge  laughed, 
the  jury  whispered,  and  I  was  convicted  in- 
stanter  of  stealing  spoons,  when  murder  it 
self  was  no  further  from  my  thoughts  than 
theft." 

"  But  they  tell  me  you  were  caught  red- 
handed,"  said  I.  "Were  not  a  half-dozen 
spoons  found  upon  your  person  ?" 

"  In  my  hand,"  returned  the  prisoner. 
"  The  spoons  were  in  my  hand  when  I  was 
arrested,  and  they  were  seen  there  by  the 
owner,  by  the  police,  and  by  the  usual  crowd 
of  small  boys  that  congregate  at  such  em 
barrassing  moments,  springing  up  out  of 
sidewalks,  dropping  down  from  the  heavens, 
swarming  in  from  everywhere.  I  had  no 
idea  there  were  so  many  small  boys  in  the 
world  until  I  was  arrested,  and  found  my- 


5OIO  BECOMES    EXCITED 


THE   GHOST   CLUB  187 

self  the  cynosure  of  a  million  or  more  inno 
cent  blue  eyes." 

"Were  they  all  blue -eyed?"  I  queried, 
thinking  the  point  interesting  from  a  scien 
tific  point  of  view,  hoping  to  discover  that 
curiosity  of  a  morbid  character  was  always 
found  in  connection  with  eyes  of  a  specified 
hue. 

"  Oh  no  ;  I  fancy  not,"  returned  my  host. 
"  But  to  a  man  with  a  load  of  another  fel 
low's  spoons  in  his  possession,  and  a  pair 
of  handcuffs  on  his  wrists,  everything  looks 
blue." 

"  I  don't  doubt  it,"  I  replied.  "  But— er 
— just  how,  now,  could  you  defend  yourself 
when  every  bit  of  evidence,  and — you  will 
excuse  me  for  saying  so  —  conclusive  evi 
dence  at  that,  pointed  to  your  guilt  ?" 

"  The  spoons  were  a  gift,"  he  answered. 

"  But  the  owner  denied  that." 

"  I  know  it ;  that's  where  the  beastly  part 
of  it  all  came  in.  They  were  not  given  to 
me  by  the  owner,  but  by  a  lot  of  mean,  low- 
down,  practical-joke-loving  ghosts." 

Number  501  o's  anger  as  he  spoke  these 
words  was  terrible  to  witness,  and  as  he 


1 88  THE   GHOST   CLUB 

strode  up  and  down  the  floor  of  his  cell  and 
dashed  his  arms  right  and  left,  I  wished  for 
a  moment  that  I  was  elsewhere.  I  should 
not  have  flown,  however,  even  had  the  cell 
door  been  open  and  my  way  clear,  for  his 
suggestion  of  a  supernatural  agency  in  con 
nection  with  his  crime  whetted  my  curiosity 
until  it  was  more  keen  than  ever,  and  I 
made  up  my  mind  to  hear  the  story  to  the 
end,  if  I  had  to  commit  a  crime  and  get  my 
self  sentenced  to  confinement  in  that  prison 
for  life  to  do  so. 

Fortunately,  extreme  measures  of  this  nat 
ure  were  unnecessary,  for  after  a  few  mo 
ments  Surrennes  calmed  down,  and  seating 
himself  beside  me  on  the  cot,  drained  his 
water-pitcher  to  the  dregs,  and  began. 

"  Excuse  me  for  not  offering  you  a  drink," 
he  said,  "  but  the  wine  they  serve  here 
while  moist  is  hardly  what  a  connoisseur 
would  choose  except  for  bathing  purposes, 
and  I  compliment  you  by  assuming  that  you 
do  not  wish  to  taste  it." 

"  Thank  you,"  I  said.  "  I  do  not  like  to 
take  water  straight,  exactly.  I  always  dilute 
it,  in  fact,  with  a  little  of  this." 


THE   GHOST   CLUB  189 

Here  I  extracted  a  small  flask  from  my 
pocket  and  handed  it  to  him. 

"  Ah !"  he  said,  smacking  his  lips  as  he 
took  a  long  pull  at  its  contents,  "  that  puts 
spirit  into  a  man." 

"  Yes,  it  does,"  I  replied,  ruefully,  as  I 
noted  that  he  had  left  me  very  little  but  the 
flask ;  "  but  I  don't  think  it  was  necessary 
for  you  to  deprive  me  of  all  mine." 

"  No ;  that  is,  you  can't  appreciate  the 
necessity  unless  you — er — you  have  suffered 
in  your  life  as  I  am  suffering.  You  were 
never  sent  up  yourself?" 

I  gave  him  a  glance  which  was  all  indig 
nation.  "I  guess  not,"  I  said.  "I  have  led 
a  life  that  is  above  reproach." 

"  Good  !"  he  replied.  "  And  what  a  satis 
faction  that  is,  eh  ?  I  don't  believe  I'd  be 
able  to  stand  this  jail  life  if  it  wasn't  for 
my  conscience,  which  is  as  clear  and  clean 
as  it  would  be  if  I'd  never  used  it." 

"Would  you  mind  telling  me  what  your 
defence  was  ?"  I  asked. 

"  Certainly  not,"  said  he,  cheerfully.  "  I'd 
be  very  glad  to  give  it  to  you.  But  you  must 
remember  one  thing — it  is  copyrighted." 


IQO  THE   GHOST   CLUB 

"  Fire  ahead !"  I  said,  with  a  smile.  "I'll 
respect  your  copyright.  I'll  give  you  a  roy 
alty  on  what  I  get  for  the  story." 

"Very  good,"  he  answered.  "  It  was  like 
this.  To  begin,  I  must  tell  you  that  when 
I  was  a  boy  preparing  for  college  I  had  for 
a  chum  a  brilliant  fun-loving  fellow  named 
Hawley  Hicks,  concerning  whose  future  va 
rious  prophecies  had  been  made.  His  moth 
er  often  asserted  that  he  would  be  a  great 
poet ;  his  father  thought  he  was  born  to  be 
a  great  general ;  our  head  -  master  at  the 
Scarberry  Institute  for  Young  Gentlemen 
prophesied  the  gallows.  They  were  all 
wrong;  though,  for  myself,  I  think  that  if 
he  had  lived  long  enough  almost  any  one  of 
the  prophecies  might  have  come  true.  The 
trouble  was  that  Hawley  died  at  the  age  of 
twenty-three.  Fifteen  years  elapsed.  I  was 
graduated  with  high  honors  at  Brazenose, 
lived  a  life  of  elegant  leisure,  and  at  the 
age  of  thirty -seven  broke  down  in  health. 
That  was  about  a  year  ago.  My  uncle, 
whose  heir  and  constant  companion  I  was, 
gave  me  a  liberal  allowance,  and  sent  me 
off  to  travel.  I  came  to  America,  landed  in 


"NO   LESS  A   PERSON  THAN   HAWLEY   HICKS  " 


THE   GHOST   CLUB  193 

New  York  early  in  September,  and  set  about 
winning  back  the  color  which  had  departed 
from  my  cheeks  by  an  assiduous  devotion  to 
such  pleasures  as  New  York  affords.  Two 
days  after  my  arrival,  I  set  out  for  an  airing 
at  Coney  Island,  leaving  my  hotel  at  four 
in  the  afternoon.  On  my  way  down  Broad 
way  I  was  suddenly  startled  at  hearing  my 
name  spoken  from  behind  me,  and  appalled, 
on  turning,  to  see  standing  with  outstretched 
hands  no  less  a  person  than  my  defunct 
chum,  Hawley  Hicks." 

"  Impossible,"  said  I. 

"  Exactly  my  remark,"  returned  Number 
5010.  "  To  which  I  added,  '  Hawley  Hicks, 
it  can't  be  you  !' 

"  '  But  it  is  me,'  he  replied. 

"  And  then  I  was  convinced,  for  Hawley 
never  was  good  on  his  grammar.  I  looked 
at  him  a  minute,  and  then  I  said, '  But,  Haw 
ley,  I  thought  you  were  dead.' 

"  '  I  am,'  he  answered.  '  But  why  should 
a  little  thing  like  that  stand  between 
friends  ?' 

" '  It  shouldn't,  Hawley,'  I  answered, 
meekly ;  '  but  it's  condemnedly  unusual,  you 


194  THE   GHOST   CLUB 

know,  for  a  man  to  associate  even  with  his 
best  friends  fifteen  years  after  they've  died 
and  been  buried.' 

" '  Do  you  mean  to  say,  Austin,  that  just 
because  I  was  weak  enough  once  to  suc 
cumb  to  a  bad  cold,  you,  the  dearest  friend 
of  my  youth,  the  closest  companion  of  my 
school-days,  the  partner  of  my  childish  joys, 
intend  to  go  back  on  me  here  in  a  strange 
city  ?' 

"  '  Hawley,'  I  answered,  huskily,  '  not  a 
bit  of  it.  My  letter  of  credit,  my  room  at 
the  hotel,  my  dress  suit,  even  my  ticket  to 
Coney  Island,  are  at  your  disposal ;  but  I 
think  the  partner  of  your  childish  joys 
ought  first  to  be  let  in  on  the  ground-floor 
of  this  enterprise,  and  informed  how  the 
deuce  you  manage  to  turn  up  in  New  York 
fifteen  years  subsequent  to  your  obsequies. 
Is  New  York  the  hereafter  for  boys  of  your 
kind,  or  is  this  some  freak  of  my  imagina 
tion  ?'  " 

"That  was  an  eminently  proper  ques 
tion,"  I  put  in,  just  to  show  that  while  the 
story  I  was  hearing  terrified  me,  I  was  not 
altogether  speechless. 


THE   GHOST   CLUB  195 

"It  was,  indeed,"  said  5010;  "and  Haw- 
ley  recognized  it  as  such,  for  he  replied  at 
once. 

"'Neither,'  said  he.  'Your  imagination 
is  all  right,  and  New  York  is  neither  heaven 
nor  the  other  place.  The  fact  is,  I'm  spook 
ing,  and  I  can  tell  you,  Austin,  it's  just  about 
the  finest  kind  of  work  there  is.  If  you 
could  manage  to  shuffle  off  your  mortal  coil 
and  get  in  with  a  lot  of  ghosts,  the  way  I 
have,  you'd  be  playing  in  great  luck.' 

" '  Thanks  for  the  hint,  Hawley,'  I  said, 
with  a  grateful  smile ;  '  but,  to  tell  you  the 
truth,  I  do  not  find  that  life  is  entirely  bad. 
I  get  my  three  meals  a  day,  keep  my  pocket 
full  of  coin,  and  sleep  eight  hours  every 
night  on  a  couch  that  couldn't  be  more  de 
sirable  if  it  were  studded  with  jewels  and 
had  mineral  springs.' 

"  '  That's  your  mortal  ignorance,  Austin,' 
he  retorted.  '  I  lived  long  enough  to  ap 
preciate  the  necessity  of  being  ignorant,  but 
your  style  of  existence  is  really  not  to  be 
mentioned  in  the  same  cycle  with  mine. 
You  talk  about  three  meals  a  day,  as  if  that 
were  an  ideal ;  you  forget  that  with  the  eat- 


196  THE   GHOST   CLUB 

ing  your  labor  is  just  begun ;  those  meals 
have  to  be  digested,  every  one  of  'em,  and 
if  you  could  only  understand  it,  it  would 
appall  you  to  see  what  a  fearful  wear  and 
tear  that  act  of  digestion  is.  In  my  life 
you  are  feasting  all  the  time,  but  with  no 
need  for  digestion.  You  speak  of  money 
in  your  pockets ;  well,  I  have  none,  yet  am 
I  the  richer  of  the  two.  I  don't  need  mon 
ey.  The  world  is  mine.  If  I  chose  to  I 
could  pour  the  contents  of  that  jeweller's 
window  into  your  lap  in  five  seconds,  but 
cui  bono  ?  The  gems  delight  my  eye  quite 
as  well  where  they  are ;  and  as  for  travel, 
Austin,  of  which  you  have  always  been  fond, 
the  spectral  method  beats  all.  Just  watch 
me!' 

"  I  watched  him  as  well  as  I  could  for  a 
minute,"  said  5010;  "and  then  he  disap 
peared.  In  another  minute  he  was  before 
me  again. 

"'Well,'  I  said,  'I  suppose  you've  been 
around  the  block  in  that  time,  eh?' 

"He  roared  with  laughter.  'Around  the 
block  ?'  he  ejaculated.  '  I  have  done  the 
Continent  of  Europe,  taken  a  run  through 


"  'JUST  WATCH  ME' 


THE   GHOST   CLUB  199 

China,  haunted  the  Emperor  of  Japan,  and 
sailed  around  the  Horn  since  I  left  you  a 
minute  ago.' 

"  He  was  a  truthful  boy  in  spite  of  his 
peculiarities,  Hawley  was,"  said  Surrennes, 
quietly,  "  so  1  had  to  believe  what  he  said. 
He  abhorred  lies." 

"  That  was  pretty  fast  travelling,  though," 
said  I.  "  He'd  make  a  fine  messenger-boy." 

"  That's  so.  I  wish  I'd  suggested  it  to 
him,"  smiled  my  host.  "  But  I  can  tell  you, 
sir,  I  was  astonished.  '  Hawley,'  I  said, 
'you  always  were  a  fast  youth,  but  I  never 
thought  you  would  develop  into  this.  I 
wonder  you're  not  out  of  breath  after  such 
a  journey.' 

"  '  Another  point,  my  dear  Austin,  in  favor 
of  my  mode  of  existence.  We  spooks  have 
no  breath  to  begin  with.  Consequently,  to 
get  out  of  it  is  no  deprivation.  But,  I  say,' 
he  added, '  whither  are  you  bound  ?' 

" '  To  Coney  Island  to  see  the  sights,'  I 
replied.  '  Won't  you  join  me  ?' 

'"Not  I,'  he  replied.  'Coney  Island  is 
tame.  When  I  first  joined  the  spectre  band, 
it  seemed  to  me  that  nothing  could  delight 


200  THE   GHOST   CLUB 

me  more  than  an  eternal  round  of  gay- 
ety  like  that ;  but,  Austin,  I  have  changed. 
I  have  developed  a  good  deal  since  you  and 
I  were  parted  at  the  grave.' 

"  '  I  should  say  you  had,'  I  answered.  '  I 
doubt  if  many  of  your  old  friends  would 
know  you.' 

" '  You  seem  to  have  had  difficulty  in  so 
doing  yourself,  Austin,'  he  replied,  regret 
fully  ;  '  but  see  here,  old  chap,  give  up 
Coney  Island,  and  spend  the  evening  with 
me  at  the  club.  You'll  have  a  good  time, 
I  can  assure  you.' 

" '  The  club  ?'  I  said.  '  You  don't  mean 
to  say  you  visions  have  a  club  ?' 

" '  I  do  indeed  ;  the  Ghost  Club  is  the 
most  flourishing  association  of  choice  spirits 
in  the  world.  We  have  rooms  in  every  city 
in  creation  ;  and  the  finest  part  of  it  is 
there  are  no  dues  to  be  paid.  The  member 
ship  list  holds  some  of  the  finest  names  in 
history — Shakespeare,  Milton,  Chaucer,  Na 
poleon  Bonaparte,  Caesar,  George  Washing 
ton,  Mozart,  Frederick  the  Great,  Marc  An 
tony— Cassius  was  black-balled  on  Caesar's 
account — Galileo,  Confucius.' 


THE   GHOST   CLUB  203 

'"You  admit  the  Chinese,  eh?'  I 
queried. 

" '  Not  always,'  he  replied.  '  But  Con 
was  such  a  good  fellow  they  hadn't  the 
heart  to  keep  him  out;  but  you  see,  Austin, 
what  a  lot  of  fine  fellows  there  are  in  it.' 

" '  Yes,  it's  a  magnificent  list,  and  I  should 
say  they  made  a  pretty  interesting  set  of 
fellows  to  hear  talk,'  I  put  in. 

"  '  Well,  rather,'  Hawley  replied.  '  I  wish 
you  could  have  heard  a  debate  between 
Shakespeare  and  Caesar  on  the  resolution, 
"  The  Pen  is  mightier  than  the  Sword ;"  it 
was  immense.' 

"  '  I  should  think  it  might  have  been,'  I 
said.  '  Which  won  ?' 

"  '  The  sword  party.  They  were  the  best 
fighters  ;  though  on  the  merits  of  the  argu 
ment  Shakespeare  was  'way  ahead.' 

'"If  I  thought  I'd  stand  a  chance  of  see 
ing  spooks  like  that,  I  think  I'd  give  up 
Coney  Island  and  go  with  you,'  I  said. 

"  '  Well,'  replied  Hawley,  '  that's  just  the 
kind  of  a  chance  you  do  stand.  They'll  all 
be  there  to-night,  and  as  this  is  ladies'  day, 
you  might  meet  Lucretia  Borgia,  Cleopatra, 


204  THE   GHOST   CLUB 

and  a  few  other  feminine  apparitions  of 
considerable  note.' 

" '  That  settles  it.  I  am  yours  for  the 
rest  of  the  day,'  I  said,  and  so  we  adjourned 
to  the  rooms  of  the  Ghost  Club. 

"These  rooms  were  in  a  beautiful  house 
on  Fifth  Avenue ;  the  number  of  the  house 
you  will  find  on  consulting  the  court  rec 
ords.  I  have  forgotten  it.  It  was  a  large, 
broad,  brown-stone  structure,  and  must  have 
been  over  one  hundred  and  fifty  feet  in 
depth.  Such  fittings  I  never  saw  before ; 
everything  was  in  the  height  of  luxury,  and 
I  am  quite  certain  that  among  beings  to 
whom  money  is  a  measure  of  possibility  no 
such  magnificence  is  attainable.  The  paint 
ings  on  the  walls  were  by  the  most  famous 
artists  of  our  own  and  other  days.  The 
rugs  on  the  superbly  polished  floors  were 
worth  fortunes,  not  only  for  their  exquisite 
beauty,  but  also  for  their  extreme  rarity. 
In  keeping  with  these  were  the  furniture 
and  brie  -a- brae.  In  short,  my  dear  sir, 
I  had  never  dreamed  of  anything  so  daz- 
zlingly,  so  superbly  magnificent  as  that 
apartment  into  which  I  was  ushered  by 


THE   GHOST   CLUB  207 

the  ghost  of  my  quondam  friend  Hawley 
Hicks. 

"At  first  I  was  speechless  with  wonder, 
which  seemed  to  amuse  Hicks  very  much." 

" '  Pretty  fine,  eh  ?'  he  said,  with  a  short 
laugh. 

" '  Well,'  I  replied,  in  a  moment,  '  consid 
ering  that  you  can  get  along  without  money, 
and  that  all  the  resources  of  the  world  are 
at  your  disposal,  it  is  not  more  than  half 
bad.  Have  you  a  library?' 

"  I  was  always  fond  of  books,'5  explained 
5010  in  parenthesis  to  me,  "and  so  was 
quite  anxious  to  see  what  the  club  of  ghosts 
could  show  in  the  way  of  literary  treasures. 
Imagine  my  surprise  when  Hawley  informed 
me  that  the  club  had  no  collection  of  the 
sort  to  appeal  to  the  bibliophile. 

"'No,'  he  answered,  'we  have  no  libra- 

ry-' 

" '  Rather  strange,'  I  said,  '  that  a  club  to 
which  men  like  Shakespeare,  Milton,  Edgar 
Allan  Poe,  and  other  deceased  literati  be 
long  should  be  deficient  in  that  respect.' 

" '  Not  at  all,'  said  he.  '  Why  should  we 
want  books  when  we  have  the  men  them- 


208  THE   GHOST   CLUB 

selves  to  tell  their  tales  to  us  ?  Would  you 
give  a  rap  to  possess  a  set  of  Shakespeare  if 
William  himself  would  sit  down  and  rattle 
off  the  whole  business  to  you  any  time  you 
chose  to  ask  him  to  do  it  ?  Would  you  fol 
low  Scott's  printed  narratives  through  their 
devious  and  tedious  periods  if  Sir  Walter  in 
spirit  would  come  to  you  on  demand,  and 
tell  you  all  the  old  stories  over  again  in  a 
tenth  part  of  the  time  it  would  take  you  to 
read  the  introduction  to  one  of  them  ?' 

"  '  I  fancy  not,'  I  said.  '  Are  you  in  such 
luck  ?' 

"  '  I  am,'  said  Hawley ;  '  only  personally  I 
never  send  for  Scott  or  Shakespeare.  I  pre 
fer  something  lighter  than  either — Douglas 
Jerrold  or  Marryat.  But  best  of  all,  I  like 
to  sit  down  and  hear  Noah  swap  animal 
stories  with  Davy  Crockett.  Noah's  the 
brightest  man  of  his  age  in  the  club.  Adam's 
kind  of  slow.' 

" '  How  about  Solomon  ?'  I  asked,  more 
to  be  flippant  than  with  any  desire  for  in 
formation.  I  was  much  amused  to  hear 
Hawley  speak  of  these  great  spirits  as  if  he 
and  they  were  chums  of  long  standing. 


MOZART   TRIES   HIS   HAND   AT   THE   BANJO 


THE   GHOST   CLUB  211 

" '  Solomon  has  resigned  from  the  club,' 
he  said,  with  a  sad  sigh.  '  He  was  a  good 
fellow,  Solomon  was,  but  he  thought  he 
knew  it  all  until  old  Doctor  Johnson  got 
hold  of  him,  and  then  he  knuckled  under. 
It's  rather  rough  for  a  man  to  get  firmly  es 
tablished  in  his  belief  that  he  is  the  wisest 
creature  going,  and  then,  after  a  couple  of 
thousand  years,  have  an  Englishman  come 
along  and  tell  him  things  he  never  knew  be 
fore,  especially  the  way  Sam  Johnson  de 
livers  himself  of  his  opinions.  Johnson 
never  cared  whom  he  hurt,  you  know,  and 
when  he  got  after  Solomon,  he  did  it  with 
all  his  might.'  " 

"  I  wonder  if  Boswell  was  there  ?"  I  vent 
ured,  interrupting  5010  in  his  extraordinary 
narrative  for  an  instant. 

"Yes,  he  was  there,"  returned  the  pris 
oner.  "  I  met  him  later  in  the  evening ;  but 
he  isn't  the  spook  he  might  be.  He  never 
had  much  spirit  anyhow,  and  when  he  died 
he  had  to  leave  his  nose  behind  him,  and 
that  settled  him." 

"Of  course,"  I  answered.  "  Boswell  with 
no  nose  to  stick  into  other  people's  affairs 


212  THE    GHOST    CLUB 

would  have  been  like  Othello  with  Desde- 
mona  left  out.  But  go  on.  What  did  you 
do  next  ?" 

"Well,"  5010  resumed,  "after  I'd  looked 
about  me,  and  drunk  my  fill  of  the  magnifi 
cence  on  every  hand,  Hawley  took  me  into 
the  music-room,  and  introduced  me  to  Mo 
zart  and  Wagner  and  a  few  other  great  com 
posers.  In  response  to  my  request,  Wagner 
played  an  impromptu  version  of  '  Daisy 
Bell'  on  the  organ.  It  was  great,-  not 
much  like  '  Daisy  Bell,'  of  course ;  more 
like  a  collision  between  a  cyclone  and  a 
simoom  in  a  tin-plate  mining  camp,  in  fact, 
but,  nevertheless,  marvellous.  I  tried  to 
remember  it  afterwards,  and  jotted  down  a 
few  notes,  but  I  found  the  first  bar  took  up 
seven  sheets  of  fool's-cap,  and  so  gave  it  up. 
Then  Mozart  tried  his  hand  on  a  banjo  for 
my  amusement,  Mendelssohn  sang  a  half- 
dozen  of  his  songs  without  words,  and  then 
Gottschalk  played  one  of  Poe's  weird  stories 
on  the  piano. 

"Then  Carlyle  came  in,  and  Hawley  in 
troduced  me  to  him.  He  was  a  gruff  old 
gentleman,  and  seemingly  anxious  to  have 


WAITING   FOR   THE  CRITICS 


THE   GHOST   CLUB  215 

Froude  become  an  eligible,  and  I  judged 
from  the  rather  fierce  manner  in  which  he 
handled  a  club  he  had  in  his  hand,  that 
there  were  one  or  two  other  men  of  promi 
nence  still  living  he  was  anxious  to  meet. 
Dickens,  too,  was  desirous  of  a  two-minute 
interview  with  certain  of  his  at  present 
purely  mortal  critics  ;  and,  between  you  and 
me,  if  the  wink  that  Bacon  gave  Shake 
speare  when  I  spoke  of  Ignatius  Donnelly 
meant  anything,  the  famous  cryptogram- 
marian  will  do  well  to  drink  a  bottle  of  the 
elixir  of  life  every  morning  before  breakfast, 
and  stave  off  dissolution  as  long  as  he  can. 
There's  no  getting  around  the  fact,  sir," 
Surrennes  added,  with  a  significant  shake 
of  the  head,  ''that  the  present  leaders  of 
literary  thought  with  critical  tendencies  are 
going  to  have  the  hardest  kind  of  a  time 
when  they  cross  the  river  and  apply  for  ad 
mission  to  the  Ghost  Club,  /don't  ask  for 
any  better  fun  than  that  of  watching  from  a 
safe  distance  the  initiation  ceremonies  of 
the  next  dozen  who  go  over.  And  as  an 
Englishman,  sir,  who  thoroughly  believes  in 
and  admires  Lord  Wolseley,  if  I  were  out  of 


2l6  THE    GHOST   CLUB 

jail  and  able  to  do  it,  I'd  write  him  a  letter, 
and  warn  him  that  he  would  better  revise 
his  estimates  of  certain  famous  soldiers  no 
longer  living  if  he  desires  to  find  rest  in  that 
mysterious  other  world  whither  he  must 
eventually  betake  himself.  They've  got 
their  swords  sharpened  for  him,  and  he'll  dis 
cover  an  instance  when  he  gets  over  there 
in  which  the  sword  is  mightier  than  the  pen. 

"After  that,  Hawley  took  me  up-stairs 
and  introduced  me  to  the  spirit  of  Napoleon 
Bonaparte,  with  whom  I  passed  about  twen 
ty-five  minutes  talking  over  his  victories  and 
defeats.  He  told  me  he  never  could  under 
stand  how  a  man  like  Wellington  came  to 
defeat  him  at  Waterloo,  and  added  that  he 
had  sounded  the  Iron  Duke  on  the  subject, 
and  found  him  equally  ignorant. 

"So  the  afternoon  and  evening  passed. 
I  met  quite  a  number  of  famous  ladies — 
Catherine,  Marie  Louise,  Josephine,  Queen 
Elizabeth,  and  others.  Talked  architecture 
with  Queen  Anne,  and  was  surprised  to  learn 
that  she  never  saw  a  Queen  Anne  cottage. 
I  took  Peg  Woffington  down  to  supper,  and 
altogether  had  a  fine  time  of  it." 


NAPOLEON   BONAPARTE  AND  THE   DUKE   OF 
WELLINGTON 


THE   GHOST   CLUB  219 

"  But,  my  dear  Surrennes,"  I  put  in  at  this 
point,  "  I  fail  to  see  what  this  has  to  do  with 
your  defence  in  your  trial  for  stealing  spoons." 

"I  am  coming  to  that,"  said  5010,  sadly. 
"  I  dwell  on  the  moments  passed  at  the  club 
because  they  were  the  happiest  of  my  life, 
and  am  loath  to  speak  of  what  followed,  but 
I  suppose  I  must.  It  was  all  due  to  Queen 
Isabella  that  I  got  into  trouble.  Peg  Wof- 
fington  presented  me  to  Queen  Isabella  in 
the  supper -room,  and  while  her  majesty 
and  I  were  talking,  I  spoke  of  how  beautiful 
everything  in  the  club  was,  and  admired  es 
pecially  a  half-dozen  old  Spanish  spoons 
upon  the  side -board.  When  I  had  done 
this,  the  Queen  called  to  Ferdinand,  who 
was  chatting  with  Columbus  on  the  other 
side  of  the  room,  to  come  to  her,  which  he 
did  with  alacrity.  I  was  presented  to  the 
King,  and  then  my  troubles  began. 

" '  Mr.  Surrennes  admires  our  spoons, 
Ferdinand,'  said  the  Queen. 

"The  King  smiled,  and  turning  to  me 
observed, '  Sir,  they  are  yours.  Er — waiter, 
just  do  these  spoons  up  and  give  them  to 
Mr.  Surrennes.' 


220  THE    GHOST   CLUB 

"Of  course,"  said  5010,  "I  protested 
against  this ;  whereupon  the  King  looked 
displeased. 

"  'It  is  a  rule  of  our  club,  sir,  as  well  as 
an  old  Spanish  custom,  for  us  to  present  to 
our  guests  anything  that  they  may  happen 
openly  to  admire.  You  are  surely  sufficient 
ly  well  acquainted  with  the  etiquette  of  club 
life  to  know  that  guests  may  not  with  pro 
priety  decline  to  be  governed  by  the  regula 
tions  of  the  club  whose  hospitality  they  are 
enjoying.' 

" '  I  certainly  am  aware  of  that,  my  dear 
King,'  I  replied,  '  and  of  course  I  accept 
the  spoons  with  exceeding  deep  gratitude. 
My  remonstrance  was  prompted  solely  by 
my  desire  to  explain  to  you  that  I  was  un 
aware  of  any  such  regulation,  and  to  assure 
you  that  when  I  ventured  to  inform  your 
good  wife  that  the  spoons  had  excited  my 
sincerest  admiration,  I  was  not  hinting  that 
it  would  please  me  greatly  to  be  accounted 
their  possessor.' 

" '  Your  courtly  speech,  sir,'  returned  the 
King,  with  a  low  bow,  'is  ample  assurance 
of  your  sincerity,  and  I  beg  that  you  will 


THE   GHOST   CLUB  223 

put  the  spoons  in  your  pocket  and  say  no 
more.  They  are  yours.  Verb,  sap' 

"  I  thanked  the  great  Spaniard  and  said 
no  more,  pocketing  the  spoons  with  no  little 
exultation,  because,  having  always  been  a 
lover  of  the  quaint  and  beautiful,  I  was 
glad  to  possess  such  treasures,  though  I 
must  confess  to  some  misgivings  as  to  the 
possibility  of  their  being  unreal.  Shortly 
after  this  episode  I  looked  at  my  watch  and 
discovered  that  it  was  getting  well  on  tow 
ards  eleven  o'clock,  and  I  sought  out  Hawley 
for  the  purpose  of  thanking  him  for  a  de 
lightful  evening  and  of  taking  my  leave.  I 
met  him  in  the  hall  talking  to  Euripides  on 
the  subject  of  the  amateur  stage  in  the 
United  States.  What  they  said  I  did  not 
stop  to  hear,  but  offering  my  hand  to  Haw- 
ley  informed  him  of  my  intention  to  depart. 

"'Well,  old  chap,'  he  said,  affectionately, 
'  I'm  glad  you  came.  It's  always  a  pleasure 
to  see  you,  and  I  hope  we  may  meet  again 
some  time  soon.'  And  then,  catching  sight 
of  my  bundle,  he  asked,  'What  have  you 
there  ?' 

"  I  informed  him  of  the  episode  in  the 


224  THE    GHOST   CLUB 

supper-room,  and  fancied  I  perceived  a  look 
of  annoyance  on  his  countenance. 

" '  I  didn't  want  to  take  them,  Hawley,'  I 
said;  'but  Ferdinand  insisted.' 

"'Oh,  it's  all  right!'  returned  Hawley. 
'  Only  I'm  sorry  !  You'd  better  get  along 
home  with  them  as  quickly  as  you  can  and 
say  nothing ;  and,  above  all,  don't  try  to 
sell  them.' 

"  '  But  why  ?'  I  asked.  '  I'd  much  prefer 
to  leave  them  here  if  there  is  any  question 
of  the  propriety  of  my — ' 

"Here,"  continued  5010,  "  Hawley  seem 
ed  to  grow  impatient,  for  he  stamped  his 
foot  angrily,  and  bade  me  go  at  once  or 
there  might  be  trouble.  I  proceeded  to 
obey  him,  and  left  the  house  instanter,  slam 
ming  the  door  somewhat  angrily  behind  me. 
Hawley's  unceremonious  way  of  speeding 
his  parting  guest  did  not  seem  to  me  to  be 
exactly  what  I  had  a  right  to  expect  at  the 
time.  I  see  now  what  his  object  was,  and 
acquit  him  of  any  intention  to  be  rude, 
though  I  must  say  if  I  ever  catch  him  again, 
I'll  wring  an  explanation  from  him  for  hav 
ing  introduced  me  into  such  bad  company. 


THE   GHOST   CLUB  225 

"As  I  walked  down  the  steps,"  said  5010, 
"  the  chimes  of  the  neighboring  church 
were  clanging  out  the  hour  of  eleven.  I 
stopped  on  the  last  step  to  look  for  a  pos 
sible  hansom-cab,  when  a  portly  gentleman 
accompanied  by  a  lady  started  to  mount 
the  stoop.  The  man  eyed  me  narrowly  for 
a  moment,  and  then,  sending  the  lady  up 
the  steps,  he  turned  to  me  and  said, 

" '  What  are  you  doing  here  ?' 

" '  I've  just  left  the  club,'  I  answered. 
'  It's  all  right.  I  was  Hawley  Hicks's  guest. 
Whose  ghost  are  you  ?' 

" '  What  the  deuce  are  you  talking  about  ?' 
he  asked,  rather  gruffly,  much  to  my  sur 
prise  and  discomfort. 

" '  I  tried  to  give  you  a  civil  answer  to 
your  question,'  I  returned,  indignantly. 

" '  I  guess  you're  crazy — or  a  thief,'  he 
rejoined. 

" '  See  here,  friend,'  I  put  in,  rather  im 
pressively,  'just  remember  one  thing.  You 
are  talking  to  a  gentleman,  and  I  don't  take 
remarks  of  that  sort  from  anybody,  spook 
or  otherwise.  I  don't  care  if  you  are  the 
ghost  of  the  Emperor  Nero,  if  you  give  me 


226  THE   GHOST   CLUB 

any  more  of  your  impudence  I'll  dissipate 
you  to  the  four  quarters  of  the  universe — 
see  ?' 

"  Then  he  grabbed  me  and  shouted  for  the 
police,  and  I  was  painfully  surprised  to  find 
that  instead  of  coping  with  a  mysterious 
being  from  another  world,  I  had  two  hun 
dred  and  ten  pounds  of  flesh  and  blood  to 
handle.  The  populace  began  to  gather. 
The  million  and  a  half  of  small  boys  of 
whom  I  have  already  spoken  —  mostly 
street  gamins,  owing  to  the  lateness  of 
the  hour  —  sprang  up  from  all  about  us. 
Hansom-cab  drivers,  attracted  by  the  noise 
of  our  altercation,  drew  up  to  the  sidewalk 
to  watch  developments,  and  then,  after  the 
usual  fifteen  or  twenty  minutes,  the  blue- 
coat  emissary  of  justice  appeared. 

"  '  Phat's  dthis  ?'  he  asked. 

" '  I  have  detected  this  man  leaving  my 
house  in  a  suspicious  manner,'  said  my  ad 
versary.  '  I  have  reason  to  suspect  him  of 
thieving.' 

111  Your  house!'  I  ejaculated,  with  fine 
scorn.  '  I've  got  you  there ;  this  is  the 
house  of  the  New  York  Branch  of  the  Ghost 


THE   GHOST   CLUB  227 

Club.  If  you  want  it  proved,'  I  added,  turn 
ing  to  the  policeman,  'ring  the  bell,  and  ask.' 

" '  Oi  t'ink  dthat's  a  fair  prophosition,' 
observed  the  policeman.  '  Is  the  motion 
siconded  ?' 

"  'Oh,  come  now !'  cried  my  captor.  '  Stop 
this  nonsense,  or  I'll  report  you  to  the  de 
partment.  This  is  my  house,  and  has  been 
for  twenty  years.  I  want  this  man  searched.' 

"  '  Oi  hov  no  warrant  permithin'  me  to 
invistigate  the  contints  ov  dthe  gintlemon's 
clothes,'  returned  the  intelligent  member  of 
the  force.  '  But  av  yez  '11  take  yer  solemn 
alibi  dthat  yez  hov  rayson  t'  belave  the  gin- 
tlemon  has  worked  ony  habeas  corpush  busi 
ness  on  yure  propherty,  oi'll  jug  dthe  blag- 
yard.' 

" '  I'll  be  responsible,'  said  the  alleged 
owner  of  the  house.  'Take  him  to  the  sta 
tion.' 

"  '  I  refuse  to  move,'  I  said. 

" '  Oi'll  not  carry  yez,'  said  the  police 
man,  'and  oi'd  advoise  ye  to  furnish  yure 
own  locomotion.  Av  ye  don't,  oi'll  use  me 
club.  Dthot's  th'  ounly  waa  yez  '11  git  dthe 
ambulanch.' 


228  THE   GHOST   CLUB 

" '  Oh,  well,  if  you  insist,'  I  replied,  '  of 
course  I'll  go.  I  have  nothing  to  fear.' 

"You  see,"  added  5010  to  me,  in  paren 
thesis,  "  the  thought  suddenly  flashed  across 
my  mind  that  if  all  was  as  my  captor  said, 
if  the  house  was  really  his  and  not  the 
Ghost  Club's,  and  if  the  whole  thing  was 
only  my  fancy,  the  spoons  themselves  would 
turn  out  to  be  entirely  fanciful ;  so  I  was  all 
right — or  at  least  I  thought  I  was.  So  we 
trotted  along  to  the  police  station.  On  the 
way  I  told  the  policeman  the  whole  story, 
which  impressed  him  so  that  he  crossed 
himself  a  half-dozen  times,  and  uttered 
numerous  ejaculatory  prayers — '  Maa  dthe 
shaints  presharve  us,'  and  '  Hivin  hov  mer- 
shy,'  and  others  of  a  like  import. 

" '  Waz  dthe  ghosht  ov  Dan  O'Connell 
dthere  ?'  he  asked. 

"  Yes,'  I  replied.  '  I  shook  hands  with 
it.' 

"  '  Let  me  shaak  dthot  hand,'  he  said,  his 
voice  trembling  with  emotion,  and  then  he 
whispered  in  my  ear :  '  Oi  belave  yez  to  be 
innoshunt ;  but  av  yez  ain't,  for  the  love  of 
Dan,  oi'll  let  yez  esficape.' 


"'LET  ME  SHAAK  DTHOT  HAND'" 


THE   GHOST   CLUB  231 

" '  Thanks,  old  fellow,'  I  replied.  '  But  I  am 
innocent  of  wrong-doing,  as  I  can  prove.' 

"  Alas !"  sighed  the  convict,  "  it  was  not 
to  be  so.  When  I  arrived  at  the  station- 
house,  I  was  dumfounded  to  learn  that  the 
spoons  were  all  too  real.  I  told  my  story 
to  the  sergeant,  and  pointed  to  the  mono 
gram,  '  G.  C.,'  on  the  spoons  as  evidence 
that  my  story  was  correct ;  but  even  that 
told  against  me,  for  the  alleged  owner's 
initials  were  G.  C. — his  name  I  withhold — 
and  the  monogram  only  served  to  substan 
tiate  his  claim  to  the  spoons.  Worst  of  all, 
he  claimed  that  he  had  been  robbed  on  sev 
eral  occasions  before  this,  and  by  midnight 
I  found  myself  locked  up  in  a  dirty  cell  to 
await  trial. 

"  I  got  a  lawyer,  and,  as  I  said  before, 
even  he  declined  to  believe  my  story,  and 
suggested  the  insanity  dodge.  Of  course  I 
wouldn't  agree  to  that.  I  tried  to  get  him 
to  subpoena  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  and 
Euripides  and  Hawley  Hicks  in  my  behalf, 
and  all  he'd  do  was  to  sit  there  and  shake 
his  head  at  me.  Then  I  suggested  going 
up  to  the  Metropolitan  Opera-house  some 


2J2  THE   GHOST   CLUB 

fearful  night  as  the  clock  struck  twelve,  and 
try  to  serve  papers  on  Wagner's  spook — all 
of  which  he  treated  as  unworthy  of  a  mo 
ment's  consideration.  Then  I  was  tried, 
convicted,  and  sentenced  to  live  in  this 
beastly  hole  ;  but  I  have  one  strong  hope  to 
buoy  me  up,  and  if  that  is  realized,  I'll  be 
free  to-morrow  morning." 

"  What  is  that  ?"  I  asked. 

"  Why,"  he  answered,  with  a  sigh,  as  the 
bell  rang  summoning  him  to  his  supper — 
"why,  the  whole  horrid  business  has  been 
so  weird  and  uncanny  that  I'm  beginning 
to  believe  it's  all  a  dream.  If  it  is,  why,  I'll 
wake  up,  and  find  myself  at  home  in  bed ; 
that's  all.  I've  clung  to  that  hope  for  nearly 
a  year  now,  but  it's  getting  weaker  every 
minute." 

"Yes,  5010,"  I  answered,  rising  and  shak 
ing  him  by  the  hand  in  parting ;  "  that's  a 
mighty  forlorn  hope,  because  I'm  pretty 
wide  awake  myself  at  this  moment,  and 
can't  be  a  part  of  your  dream.  The  great 
pity  is  you  didn't  try  the  insanity  dodge." 

"  Tut !"  he  answered.  "  That  is  the  last 
resource  of  a  weak  mind." 


A   PSYCHICAL    PRANK 


WILLIS  had  met  Miss  Hollister  but  once, 
and  that,  for  a  certain  purpose,  was  suffi 
cient.  He  was  smitten.  She  represented 
in  every  way  his  ideal,  although  until  he 
had  met  her  his  ideal  had  been  something 
radically  different.  She  was  not  at  all 
Junoesque,  and  the  maiden  of  his  dreams 
had  been  decidedly  so.  She  had  auburn 
hair,  which  hitherto  Willis  had  detested. 
Indeed,  if  the  same  hirsute  wealth  had 
adorned  some  other  woman's  head,  Willis 
would  have  called  it  red.  This  shows  how 
completely  he  was  smitten.  She  changed 
his  point  of  view  entirely.  She  shattered 
his  old  ideal  and  set  herself  up  in  its  stead, 
and  she  did  most  of  it  with  a  smile. 

There  was  something,  however,  about 
Miss  Hollister's  eyes  that  contributed  to 


234  A    PSYCHICAL    PRANK 

the  smiting  of  Willis's  heart.  They  were 
great  round  lustrous  orbs,  and  deep.  So 
deep  were  they  and  so  penetrating  that 
Willis's  affections  were  away  beyond  their 
own  depth  the  moment  Miss  Hollister's 
eyes  looked  into  his,  and  at  the  same  time 
he  had  a  dim  and  slightly  uncomfortable 
notion  that  she  could  read  every  thought 
his  mind  held  within  its  folds — or  rather, 
that  she  could  see  how  utterly  devoid  of 
thought  that  mind  was  upon  this  ecstatic 
occasion,  for  Willis's  brain  was  set  all  agog 
by  the  sensations  of  the  moment. 

"  By  Jove  !"  he  said  to  himself  afterwards 
— for  Willis,  wise  man  that  he  could  be  on 
occasions,  was  his  own  confidant,  to  the 
exclusion  of  all  others  —  "by  Jove!  I  be 
lieve  she  can  peer  into  my  very  soul ;  and  if 
she  can,  my  hopes  are  blasted,  for  she  must 
be  able  to  see  that  a  soul  like  mine  is  no 
more  worthy  to  become  the  affinity  of  one 
like  hers  than  a  mountain  rill  can  hope  to 
rival  the  Amazon." 

Nevertheless,  Willis  did  hope. 

"  Something  may  turn  up,  and  perhaps — 
perhaps  I  can  devise  some  scheme  by  means 


A    PSYCHICAL    PRANK.  235 

of  which  my  imperfections  can  be  hidden 
from  her.  Maybe  I  can  put  stained  glass 
over  the  windows  of  my  soul,  and  keep  her 
from  looking  through  them  at  my  short 
comings.  Smoked  glasses,  perhaps — and 
why  not?  If  smoked  glasses  can  be  used 
by  mortals  gazing  at  the  sun,  why  may  they 
not  be  used  by  me  when  gazing  into  those 
scarcely  less  glorious  orbs  of  hers  ?" 

Alas  for  Willis  !  The  fates  were  against 
him.  A  far-off  tribe  of  fates  were  in  league 
to  blast  his  chances  of  success  forever,  and 
this  was  how  it  happened  : 

Willis  had  occasion  one  afternoon  to  come 
up  town  early.  At  the  corner  of  Broadway 
and  Astor  Place  he  entered  a  Madison  Ave 
nue  car,  paid  his  fare,  and  sat  down  in  one 
of  the  corner  seats  at  the  rear  end  of  the 
car.  His  mind  was,  as  usual,  intent  upon 
the  glorious  Miss  Hollister.  Surely  no  one 
who  had  once  met  her  could  do  otherwise 
than  think  of  her  constantly,  he  reflected ; 
and  the  reflection  made  him  a  bit  jealous. 
What  business  had  others  to  think  of  her? 
Impertinent,  grovelling  mortals !  No  man 
was  good  enough  to  do  that—  no,  not  even 


236  A    PSYCHICAL    PRANK 

himself.  But  he  could  change.  He  could 
at  least  try  to  be  worthy  of  thinking  about 
her,  and  he  knew  of  no  other  man  who 
could.  He'd  like  to  catch  any  one  else 
doing  so  little  as  mentioning  her  name  ! 

"  Impertinent,  grovelling  mortals  !"  he  re 
peated. 

And  then  the  car  stopped  at  Seventeenth 
Street,  and  who  should  step  on  board  but 
Miss  Hollister  herself! 

"  The  idea !"  thought  Willis.  "  By  Jove  ! 
there  she  is — on  a  horse-car,  too  !  How 
atrocious  !  One  might  as  well  expect  to  see 
Minerva  driving  in  a  grocer's  wagon  as 
Miss  Hollister  in  a  horse-car.  Miserable, 
untactful  world  to  compel  Minerva  to  ride 
in  a  horse-cart,  or  rather  Miss  Hollister  to 
ride  in  a  grocer's  car !  Absurdest  of  ab 
surdities  !" 

Here  he  raised  his  hat,  for  Miss  Hollister 
had  bowed  sweetly  to  him  as  she  passed  on 
to  the  far  end  of  the  car,  where  she  stood 
hanging  on  to  a  strap. 

"  I  wonder  why  she  doesn't  sit  down  ?" 
thought  Willis ;  for  as  he  looked  about  the 
car  he  observed  that  with  the  exception  of 


A    PSYCHICAL    PRANK  237 

the  one  he  occupied  all  the  seats  were  va 
cant.  In  fact,  the  only  persons  on  board 
were  Miss  Hollister,  the  driver,  the  con 
ductor,  and  himself. 

"  I  think  I'll  go  speak  to  her,"  he  thought. 
And  then  he  thought  again  :  "  No,  I'd  bet 
ter  not.  She  saw  me  when  she  entered, 
and  if  she  had  wished  to  speak  to  me  she 
would  have  sat  down  here  beside  me,  or 
opposite  me  perhaps.  I  shall  show  myself 
worthy  of  her  by  not  thrusting  my  presence 
upon  her.  But  I  wonder  why  she  stands  ? 
She  looks  tired  enough." 

Here  Miss  Hollister  indulged  in  a  very 
singular  performance.  She  bowed  her  head 
slightly  at  some  one,  apparently  on  the  side 
walk,  Willis  thought,  murmured  something, 
the  purport  of  which  Willis  could  not  catch, 
and  sat  down  in  the  middle  of  the  seat  on 
the  other  side  of  the  car,  looking  very  much 
annoyed — in  fact,  almost  unamiable. 

Willis  was  more  mystified  than  ever ;  but 
his  mystification  was  as  nothing  compared  to 
his  anxiety  when,  on  reaching  Forty-second 
Street,  Miss  Hollister  rose,  and  sweeping  by 
him  without  a  sign  of  recognition,  left  the  car. 


238  A    PSYCHICAL    PRANK 

"  Cut,  by  thunder  !"  ejaculated  Willis,  in 
consternation.  "  And  why,  I  wonder  ?  Most 
incomprehensible  affair.  Can  she  be  a 
woman  of  whims  —  with  eyes  like  those? 
Never.  Impossible.  And  yet  what  else 
can  be  the  matter  ?" 

Try  as  he  might,  Willis  could  not  solve 
the  problem.  It  was  utterly  past  solution 
as  far  as  he  was  concerned. 

"  I'll  find  out,  and  I'll  find  out  like  a 
brave  man,"  he  said,  after  racking  his  brains 
for  an  hour  or  two  in  a  vain  endeavor  to 
get  at  the  cause  of  Miss  Hollister's  cut. 
"  I'll  call  upon  her  to-night  and  ask  her." 

He  was  true  to  his  first  purpose,  but  not 
to  his  second.  He  called,  but  he  did  not  ask 
her,  for  Miss  Hollister  did  not  give  him  the 
chance  to  do  so.  Upon  receiving  his  card 
she  sent  down  word  that  she  was  out.  Two 
days  later,  meeting  him  face  to  face  upon 
the  street,  she  gazed  coldly  at  him,  and  cut 
him  once  more.  Six  months  later  her  en 
gagement  to  a  Boston  man  was  announced, 
and  in  the  autumn  following  Miss  Hollister 
of  New  York  became  Mrs.  Barrows  of  Bos 
ton.  There  were  cards,  but  Willis  did  not 


A    PSYCHICAL    PRANK  239 

receive  one  of  them.  The  cut  was  indeed 
complete  and  final.  But  why  ?  That  had 
now  become  one  of  the  great  problems  of 
Willis's  life.  What  had  he  done  to  be  so 
badly  treated  ? 


II 


A  year  passed  by,  and  Willis  recovered 
from  the  dreadful  blow  to  his  hopes,  but  he 
often  puzzled  over  Miss  Hollister's  singular 
behavior  towards  him.  He  had  placed  the 
matter  before  several  of  his  friends,  and, 
with  the  exception  of  one  of  them,  none 
was  more  capable  of  solving  his  problem 
than  he.  This  one  had  heard  from  his  wife, 
a  school  friend  and  intimate  acquaintance  of 
Miss  Hollister,  now  Mrs.  Barrows,  that  Wil 
lis's  ideal  had  once  expressed  herself  to  the 
effect  that  she  had  admired  Willis  very  much 
until  she  had  discovered  that  he  was  not 
always  as  courteous  as  he  should  be. 

"  Courteous  ?  Not  as  courteous  as  I 
should  be  ?"  retorted  Willis.  "  When  have 
I  ever  been  anything  else  ?  Why,  my  dear 
Bronson,"  he  added,  "you  know  what  my 


240  A    PSYCHICAL    PRANK 

attitude  towards  womankind  —  as  well  as 
mankind — has  always  been.  If  there  is  a 
creature  in  the  world  whose  politeness  is 
his  weakness,  I  am  that  creature.  I'm  the 
most  courteous  man  living.  When  I  play 
poker  in  my  own  rooms  I  lose  money,  be 
cause  I've  made  it  a  rule  never  to  beat  my 
guests  in  cards  or  anything  else." 

"That  isn't  politeness,"  said  Bronson. 
"  That's  idiocy." 

"It  proves  my  point,"  retorted  Willis. 
"I'm  polite  to  the  verge  of  insanity.  Not 
as  courteous  as  I  should  be !  Great  Scott ! 
What  did  I  ever  do  or  say  to  give  her  that 
idea  ?" 

"  I  don't  know,"  Bronson  replied.  "  Bet 
ter  ask  her.  Maybe  you  overdid  your  po 
liteness.  Overdone  courtesy  is  often  worse 
than  boorishness.  You  may  have  been  so 
polite  on  some  occasion  that  you  made  Miss 
Hollister  think  you  considered  her  an  infe 
rior  person.  You  know  what  the  poet  insin 
uated.  Sorosis  holds  no  fury  like  a  woman 
condescended  to  by  a  man." 

"  I've  half  a  mind  to  write  to  Mrs.  Bar 
rows  and  ask  her  what  I  did,"  said  Willis. 


A    PSYCHICAL    PRANK  241 

"That  would  be  lovely,"  said  Bronson. 
"  Barrows  would  be  pleased." 

"  True.  I  never  thought  of  that,"  replied 
Willis. 

"  You  are  not  a  thoughtful  thinker,"  said 
Bronson,  dryly.  "If  I  were  you  I'd  bide 
my  time,  and  some  day  you  may  get  an  ex 
planation.  Stranger  things  have  happened; 
and  my  wife  tells  me  that  the  Barrowses  are 
to  spend  the  coming  winter  in  New  York. 
You'll  meet  them  out  somewhere,  no  doubt." 

"  No ;  I  shall  decline  to  go  where  they 
are.  No  woman  shall  cut  me  a  second 
time  —  not  even  Mrs.  Barrows,"  said  Wil 
lis,  firmly. 

"  Good  !  Stand  by  your  colors,"  said 
Bronson,  with  an  amused  smile. 

A  week  or  two  later  Willis  received  an 
invitation  from  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Bronson  to 
dine  with  them  informally.  "  I  have  some 
very  clever  friends  I  want  you  to  meet,"  she 
wrote.  "  So  be  sure  to  come." 

Willis  went.  The  clever  friends  were  Mr. 
and  Mrs.  Barrows  ;  and,  to  the  surprise  of 
Willis,  he  was  received  most  effusively  by 
the  quondam  Miss  Hollister. 


242  A    PSYCHICAL    PRANK 

"Why,  Mr.  Willis,"  she  said,  extending 
her  hand  to  him.  "  How  delightful  to  see 
you  again  !" 

"Thank  you,"  said  Willis,  in  some  con 
fusion.  "I  —  er  —  I  am  sure  it  is  a  very 
pleasant  surprise  for  me.  I  —  er  —  had  no 
idea—" 

"  Nor  I,"  returned  Mrs.  Barrows.  "  And 
really  I  should  have  been  a  little  embar 
rassed,  I  think,  had  I  known  you  were  to 
be  here.  I — ha  !  ha ! — it's  so  very  absurd 
that  I  almost  hesitate  to  speak  of  it — but  I 
feel  I  must.  I've  treated  you  very  badly." 

"  Indeed !"  said  Willis,  with  a  smile. 
"  How,  pray  ?" 

"  Well,  it  wasn't  my  fault  really,"  returned 
Mrs.  Barrows ;  "  but  do  you  remember,  a 
little  over  a  year  ago,  my  riding  up-town  on 
a  horse-car — a  Madison  Avenue  car — with 
you  ?" 

"  H'm  !"  said  Willis,  with  an  affectation  of 
reflection.  "  Let  me  see  ;  ah — yes — I  think 
I  do.  We  were  the  only  ones  on  board,  I 
believe,  and — ah — 

Here  Mrs.  Barrows  laughed  outright. 
"You  thought  we  were  the  only  ones  on 


A    PSYCHICAL  PRANK  243 

board,  but — we  weren't.  The  car  was  crowd 
ed,"  she  said. 

"  Then  I  don't  remember  it,"  said  Willis. 
"  The  only  time  I  ever  rode  on  a  horse-car 
with  you  to  my  knowledge  was — 

"  I  know ;  this  was  the  occasion,"  inter 
rupted  Mrs.  Barrows.  "  You  sat  in  a  cor 
ner  at  the  rear  end  of  the  car  when  I  entered, 
and  I  was  very  much  put  out  with  you  be 
cause  it  remained  for  a  stranger,  whom  I 
had  often  seen  and  to  whom  I  had,  for  rea 
sons  unknown  even  to  myself,  taken  a  deep 
aversion,  to  offer  me  his  seat,  and,  what  is 
more,  compel  me  to  take  it." 

"  I  don't  understand,"  said  Willis.  "  We 
were  alone  on  the  car." 

"To  your  eyes  we  were,  although  at  the 
time  I  did  not  know  it.  To  my  eyes  when 
I  boarded  it  the  car  was  occupied  by  enough 
people  to  fill  all  the  seats.  You  returned 
my  bow  as  I  entered,  but  did  not  offer  me 
your  seat.  The  stranger  did,  and  while  I 
tried  to  decline  it,  I  was  unable  to  do  so. 
He  was  a  man  of  about  my  own  age,  and 
he  had  a  most  remarkable  pair  of  eyes. 
There  was  no  resisting  them.  His  offer 


244  A    PSYCHICAL    PRANK 

was  a  command  ;  and  as  I  rode  along  and 
thought  of  your  sitting  motionless  at  the 
end  of  the  car,  compelling  me  to  stand,  and 
being  indirectly  responsible  for  my  accept 
ance  of  courtesies  from  a  total  and  disagree 
able  stranger,  I  became  so  very  indignant 
with  you  that  I  passed  you  without  recog 
nition  as  soon  as  I  could  summon  up  cour 
age  to  leave.  I  could  not  understand  why 
you,  who  had  seemed  to  me  to  be  the  soul 
of  politeness,  should  upon  this  occasion 
have  failed  to  do  not  what  I  should  exact 
from  any  man,  but  what  I  had  reason  to  ex 
pect  of  you." 

"  But,  Mrs.  Barrows,"  remonstrated  Wil 
lis,  "  why  should  I  give  up  a  seat  to  a  lady 
when  there  were  twenty  other  seats  unoccu 
pied  on  the  same  car?" 

"  There  is  no  reason  in  the  world  why  you 
should,"  replied  Mrs.  Barrows.  "  But  it  was 
not  until  last  winter  that  I  discovered  the 
,  trick  that  had  been  put  upon  us." 

"  Ah  ?"  said  Willis.     "  Trick  ?" 

"  Yes,"  said  Mrs.  Barrows.  "  It  was  a 
trick.  The  car  was  empty  to  your  eyes, 
but  crowded  to  mine  with  the  astral  bodies 


A    PSYCHICAL    PRANK  245 

of  the  members  of  the  Boston  Theosoph- 
ical  Society." 

"  Wha-a-at  ?"  roared  Willis. 

"  It  is  just  as  I  have  said,"  replied  Mrs. 
Barrows,  with  a  silvery  laugh.  "They  are 
all  great  friends  of  my  husband's,  and  one 
night  last  winter  he  dined  them  at  our 
house,  and  who  do  you  suppose  walked  in 
first  ?" 

"  Madame  Blavatsky's  ghost  ?"  suggested 
Willis,  with  a  grin. 

"Not  quite,"  returned  MKS.  Barrows. 
"But  the  horrible  stranger  of  the  horse- 
car  ;  and,  do  you  know,  he  recalled  the 
whole  thing  to  my  mind,  assuring  me  that 
he  and  the  others  had  projected  their  astral 
bodies  over  to  New  York  for  a  week,  and 
had  a  magnificent  time  unperceived  by  all 
save  myself,  who  was  unconsciously  psychic, 
and  so  able  to  perceive  them  in  their  invisi 
ble  forms." 

"  It  was  a  mean  trick  on  me,  Mrs.  Bar 
rows,"  said  Willis,  ruefully,  as  soon  as  he 
had  recovered  sufficiently  from  his  surprise 
to  speak. 

"Oh  no,"  she  replied,  with  a  repetition 


246  A    PSYCHICAL    PRANK 

of  her  charming  laugh,  which  rearoused  in 
Willis's  breast  all  the  regrets  of  a  lost  cause. 
"They  didn't  intend  it  especially  for  you, 
anyhow." 

"Well,"  said  Willis,  "I  think  they  did. 
They  were  friends  of  your  husband's,  and 
they  wanted  to  ruin  me." 

"  Ruin  you  ?  And  why  should  the  friends 
of  Mr.  Barrows  have  wished  to  do  that?" 
asked  Mrs.  Barrows,  in  astonishment. 

"  Because,"  began  Willis,  slowly  and  soft 
ly — "  because  they  probably  knew  that  from 
the  moment  I  met  you,  I —  But  that  is  a 
story  with  a  disagreeable  climax,  Mrs.  Bar 
rows,  so  I  shall  not  tell  it.  How  do  you 
like  Boston  ?" 


THE  LITERARY  REMAINS  OF 
THOMAS  BRAGDON 

I  WAS  much  pained  one  morning  last  win 
ter  on  picking  up  a  copy  of  the  Times  to 
note  therein  the  announcement  of  the  death 
of  my  friend  Tom  Bragdon,  from  a  sudden 
attack  of  la  grippe.  The  news  stunned  me. 
It  was  like  a  clap  of  thunder  out  of  a  clear 
sky,  for  I  had  not  even  heard  that  Tom  was 
ill ;  indeed,  we  had  parted  not  more  than 
four  days  previously  after  a  luncheon  to 
gether,  at  which  it  was  I  who  was  the  object 
of  his  sympathy  because  a  severe  cold  pre 
vented  my  enjoyment  of  the  whitebait,  the 
fillet,  the  cigar,  and  indeed  of  everything, 
not  even  excepting  Bragdon's  conversation, 
which  upon  that  occasion  should  have 
seemed  more  than  usually  enlivening,  since 
he  was  in  one  of  his  most  exuberant  moods. 
His  last  words  to  me  were,  "  Take  care  of 


248  THE    LITERARY    REMAINS 

yourself,  Phil !  I  should  hate  to  have  you 
die,  for  force  of  habit  is  so  strong  with  me 
that  I  shall  forever  continue  to  lunch  with 
none  but  you,  ordering  two  portions  of 
everything,  which  I  am  sure  I  could  not 
eat,  and  how  wasteful  that  would  be!"  And 
now  he  had  passed  over  the  threshold  into 
the  valley,  and  I  was  left  to  mourn. 

I  had  known  Bragdon  as  a  successful 
commission  merchant  for  some  ten  or  fif 
teen  years,  during  which  period  of  time  we 
had  been  more  or  less  intimate,  particularly 
so  in  the  last  five  years  of  his  life,  when  we 
were  drawn  more  closely  together ;  I,  at 
tracted  by  the  absolute  genuineness  of  his 
character,  his  delightful  fancy,  and  to  my 
mind  wonderful  originality,  for  I  never  knew 
another  like  him-,  he,  possibly  by  the  fact 
that  I  was  one  of  the  very  few  who  could 
entirely  understand  him,  could  sympathize 
with  his  peculiarities,  which  were  many,  and 
was  always  ready  to  enter  into  any  one  of 
his  odd  moods,  and  with  quite  as  much 
spirit  as  he  himself  should  display.  It  was 
an  ideal  friendship. 

It  had  been  our  custom  every  summer  to 


OF    THOMAS    BRAGDON  251 

take  what  Bragdon  called  spirit  trips  to 
gether —  that  is  to  say,  generally  in  the 
early  spring,  Bragdon  and  I  would  choose 
some  out-of-the-way  corner  of  the  world  for 
exploration  ;  we  would  each  read  all  the  lit 
erature  that  we  could  find  concerning  the 
chosen  locality,  saturate  our  minds  with  the 
spirit,  atmosphere,  and  history  of  the  place, 
and  then  in  August,  boarding  a  small 
schooner-rigged  boat  belonging  to  Bragdon, 
we  would  cruise  about  the  Long  Island 
Sound  or  sail  up  and  down  the  Hudson 
River  for  a  week,  where,  tabooing  all  other 
subjects,  we  would  tell  each  other  all  that 
we  had  been  able  to  discover  concerning  the 
place  we  had  decided  upon  for  our  imagi 
nary  visit.  In  this  way  we  became  tolerably 
familiar  with  several  places  of  interest  which 
neither  of  us  had  ever  visited,  and  which,  in 
my  case,  financial  limitations,  and  in  Brag- 
don's,  lack  of  time,  were  likely  always  to 
prevent  our  seeing.  As  I  remember  the 
matter,  this  plan  was  Bragdon's  own,  and 
its  first  suggestion  by  him  was  received  by 
me  with  a  smile  of  derision  ;  but  the  quaint- 
ness  of  the  idea  in  time  won  me  over,  and 


252  THE    LITERARY    REMAINS 

after  the  first  trial,  when  we  made  a  spirit 
trip  to  Beloochistan,  I  was  so  fascinated  by 
my  experience  that  I  eagerly  looked  forward 
to  a  second  in  the  series,  and  was  always 
thereafter  only  too  glad  to  bear  my  share  of 
the  trouble  and  ^expense  of  our  annual  jour- 
neyings.  In  this  manner  we  had  practically 
circumnavigated  this  world  and  one  or  two 
of  the  planets ;  for,  content  as  we  were  to 
visit  unseen  countries  in  spirit  only,  we  were 
never  hampered  by  the  ordinary  limitations 
of  travel,  and  where  books  failed  to  supply 
us  with  information  the  imagination  was 
called  into  play.  The  universe  was  open 
to  us  at  the  expense  of  a  captain  for  our 
sharpie,  canned  provisions  for  a  week,  and  a 
moderate  consumption  of  gray  matter  in  the 
conjuring  up  of  scenes  with  which  neither 
ourselves  nor  others  were  familiar.  The 
trips  were  refreshing  always,  and  in  the  case 
of  our  spirit  journey  through  Italy,  which  at 
that  time  neither  of  us  had  visited,  but  which 
I  have  since  had  the  good-fortune  to  see  in 
the  fulness  of  her  beauty,  I  found  it  to  be 
far  more  delightful  than  the  reality. 

"We'll  go   in,"  said   Bragdon,  when  he 


OF    THOMAS    BRAGDON  255 

proposed  the  Italian  tour,  "  by  the  St.  Goth- 
ard  route,  the  description  of  which  I  will 
prepare  in  detail  myself.  You  can  take  the 
lakes,  rounding  up  with  Como.  I  will  fol 
low  with  the  trip  from  Como  to  Milan,  and 
Milan  shall  be  my  care.  You  can  do  Ve 
rona  and  Padua ;  I  Venice.  Then  we  can 
both  try  our  hands  at  Rome  and  Naples ; 
in  the  latter  place,  to  save  time,  I  will  take 
Pompeii,  you  Capri.  Thence  we  can  hark 
back  to  Rome,  thence  to  Pisa,  Genoa,  and 
Turin,  giving  a  day  to  Siena  and  some  of  the 
quaint  Etruscan  towns,  passing  out  by  the 
Mont  Cenis  route  from  Turin  to  Geneva. 
If  you  choose  you  can  take  a  run  along  the 
Riviera  and  visit  Monte  Carlo.  For  my 
own  part,  though,  I'd  prefer  not  to  do  that, 
because  it  brings  a  sensational  element  into 
the  trip  which  I  don't  particularly  care  for. 
You'd  have  to  gamble,  and  if  your  imagina 
tion  is  to  have  full  play  you  ought  to  lose 
all  your  money,  contemplate  suicide,  and  all 
that.  I  don't  think  the  results  would  be 
worth  the  mental  strain  you'd  have  to  go 
through,  and  I  certainly  should  not  enjoy 
hearing  about  it.  The  rest  of  the  trip, 


256  THE    LITERARY    REMAINS 

though,  we  can  do  easily  in  five  days,  which 
will  leave  us  two  for  fishing,  if  we  feel  so 
disposed.  They  say  the  blue-fish  are  bit 
ing  like  the  devil  this  year." 

I  regret  now  that  we  did  not  include  a 
stenographer  among  the  necessaries  of  our 
spirit  trips,  for,  as  I  look  back  upon  that 
Italian  tour,  it  was  well  worthy  of  preserva 
tion  in  book  form,  particularly  Bragdon's 
contributions,  which  were  so  delightfully 
imaginative  that  I  cannot  but  rejoice  that 
he  did  not  live  to  visit  the  scenes  of  which 
he  so  eloquently  spoke  to  me  upon  that 
occasion.  The  reality,  I  fear,  would  have 
been  a  sore  disappointment  to  him,  partic 
ularly  in  relation  to  Venice,  concerning 
which  his  notions  were  vaguely  suggestive 
of  an  earthly  floating  paradise. 

"  Ah,  Philip,"  he  said,  as  we  cast  anchor 
one  night  in  a  little  inlet  near  Milford,  Con 
necticut,  "  I  shall  never  forget  Venice. 
This,"  he  added,  waving  his  hand  over  the 
silvery  surface  of  the  moonlit  water — "  this 
reminds  me  of  it.  All  is  so  still,  so  roman 
tic,  so  beautiful.  I  arrived  late  at  night, 
and  my  first  sensations  were  those  of  a  man 


"MORE   BEAUTIFUL  THAN   THE   REALITY' 


OF   THOMAS    BRAGDON  259 

who  has  entered  a  city  of  the  dead.  The 
bustle,  the  noise  and  clatter,  of  a  great  city 
were  absent;  nothing  was  there  but  the 
massive  buildings  rising  up  out  of  the  still, 
peaceful  waters  like  gigantic  tombs,  and  as 
my  gondolier  guided  the  sombre  black  craft 
to  which  I  had  confided  my  safety  and  that 
of  my  valise,  gliding  in  and  out  along  those 
dark  unlit  streams,  a  great  wave  of  melan 
choly  swept  over  me,  and  then,  passing  from 
the  minor  streets  into  the  Grand  Canal,  the 
melancholy  was  dispelled  by  the  brilliant 
scene  that  met  my  eyes  —  great  floods  of 
light  coming  from  everywhere,  the  brilliance 
of  each  ray  re-enforced  by  its  reflection  in 
the  silent  river  over  which  I  was  speeding. 
It  was  like  a  glimpse  of  paradise,  and  when 
I  reached  my  palace  I  was  loath  to  leave 
the  gondola,  for  I  really  felt  as  though  I 
could  glide  along  in  that  way  through  all 
eternity." 

"  You  lived  in  a  palace  in  Venice  ?'!  I 
asked,  somewhat  amused  at  the  magnifi 
cence  of  this  imaginary  tour. 

"  Certainly.  Why  not  ?"  he  replied.  "  I 
could  not  bring  myself  to  staying  in  a  hotel, 


260  THE    LITERARY    REMAINS 

Phil,  in  Venice.  Venice  is  of  a  past  age, 
when  hotels  were  not,  and  to  be  thoroughly 
en  rapport  with  my  surroundings,  I  took  up 
my  abode  in  a  palace,  as  I  have  said.  It 
was  on  one  of  the  side  streets,  to  be  sure, 
but  it  was  yet  a  palace,  and  a  beautiful  one. 
And  that  street !  It  was  a  rivulet  of  beauty, 
in  which  could  be  seen  myriads  of  golden- 
hued  fish  at  play,  which  as  the  gondola 
passed  to  and  fro  would  flirt  into  hiding 
until  the  intruder  had  passed  out  of  sight 
in  the  Grand  Canal,  after  which  they  would 
come  slowly  back  again  to  render  the  silver 
waters  almost  golden  with  their  brilliance." 

"  Weren't  you  rather  extravagant,  Tom  ?" 
I  asked.  "  Palaces  are  costly,  are  they  not  ?" 

"  Oh  no,"  he  replied,  with  as  much  grav 
ity  as  though  he  had  really  taken  the  trip 
and  was  imparting  information  to  a  seeker 
after  knowledge.  "  It  was  not  extravagant 
when  you  consider  that  anything  in  Venice 
in  the  way  of  a  habitable  house  is  called  a 
palace,  and  that  there  are  no  servants  to  be 
tipped;  that  your  lights,  candles  all,  cost 
you  first  price  only,  and  not  the  profit  of 
the  landlord,  plus  that  of  the  concierge,  plus 


OF    THOMAS    BRAGDON  261 

that  of  the  maid,  plus  several  other  small 
but  aggravatingly  augmentative  sums  which 
make  your  hotel  bills  seem  like  highway 
robbery.  No,  living  in  a  palace,  on  the 
whole,  is  cheaper  than  living  in  a  hotel ;  in 
cidentals  are  less  numerous  and  not  so  cost 
ly  ;  and  then  you  are  so  independent.  Mine 
was  a  particularly  handsome  structure.  I 
believe  I  have  a  picture  of  it  here." 

Here  Bragdon  fumbled  in  his  satchel  for 
a  moment,  and  then  dragged  forth  a  small 
unmounted  photograph  of  a  Venetian  street 
scene,  and,  pointing  out  an  ornate  structure 
at  the  left  of  the  picture,  assured  me  that 
that  was  his  palace,  though  he  had  forgot 
ten  the  name  of  it. 

"  By-the-way,"  he  said,  "let  me  say  par 
enthetically  that  I  think  our  foreign  trips 
will  have  a  far  greater  vraisemblance  if  we 
heighten  the  illusion  with  a  few  photographs, 
don't  you  ?  They  cost  about  a  quarter 
apiece  at  Blank's,  in  Twenty-third  Street." 

"A  good  idea  that,"  I  answered,  amused  at 
the  thoroughness  with  which  Bragdon  was 
"doing"  Venice.  "We  can  remember  what 
we  haven't  seen  so  very  much  more  easily." 


262  THE    LITERARY    REMAINS 

"  Yes,"  Bragdon  said, "  and  besides,  they'll 
keep  us  from  exaggeration." 

And  then  he  went  on  to  tell  me  of  his 
month  in  Venice ;  how  he  chartered  a  gon 
dola  for  the  whole  of  his  stay  there  from  a 
handsome  romantic  Venetian  youth,  whose 
name  was  on  a  card  Tom  had  had  printed 
for  the  occasion,  reading  : 


GIUSEPPE    ZOCCO 

GONDOLAS  AT  ALL  HOURS 

Cor.  Grand  Canal  and  Garibaldi  St. 


"  Giuseppe  was  a  character,"  Bragdon 
said.  "  One  of  the  remnants  of  a  by-gone 
age.  He  could  sing  like  a  bird,  and  at  night 
he  used  to  bring  his  friends  around  to  the 
front  of  my  palace  and  hitch  up  to  one  of 
the  piles  that  were  driven  beside  my  door 
step,  and  there  they'd  sing  their  soft  Italian 
melodies  for  me  by  the  hour.  It  was  better 
than  Italian  opera,  and  only  cost  me  ten 
dollars  for  the  whole  season." 

"And  did  this  Giuseppe  speak  English, 


GlUSKl'PE   ZOCCO 


OF    THOMAS    BRAGDON  265 

Tom  ?"  I  queried,  "or  did  you  speak  Italian  ? 
I  am  curious  to  know  how  you  got  on  to 
gether  in  a  conversational  sense." 

"  That  is  a  point,  my  dear  Phil,"  Bragdon 
replied,  "  that  1  have  never  decided.  I  have 
looked  at  it  from  every  point  of  view,  and  it 
has  baffled  me.  I  have  asked  myself  the 
question,  which  would  be  the  more  likely, 
that  Giuseppe  should  speak  English,  or  that 
I  should  speak  Italian  ?  It  has  seemed  to 
me  that  the  latter  would  be  the  better  way, 
for,  all  things  considered,  an  American  prod 
uce-broker  is  more  likely  to  be  familiar 
with  the  Italian  tongue  than  a  Venetian  gon 
dola-driver  with  the  English.  On  the  other 
hand,  we  want  our  accounts  of  these  trips 
to  seem  truthful,  and  you  know  that  I  am 
not  familiar  with  Italian,  and  we  do  not 
either  of  us  know  that  a  possible  Zocco 
would  not  be  a  fluent  speaker  of  English. 
To  be  honest  with  you,  I  will  say  that  I 
had  hoped  you  would  not  ask  the  ques 
tion." 

"Well,"  I  answered,  "I'll  withdraw  it. 
As  this  is  only  a  spirit  trip  we  can  each  de 
cide  the  point  as  it  seems  best  to  us." 


266  THE    LITERARY    REMAINS 

"  I  think  that  is  the  proper  plan,"  he  said, 
and  then,  proceeding  with  his  story,  he  de 
scribed  to  me  the  marvellous  paintings  that 
adorned  the  walls  of  his  palace ;  how  he 
had  tried  to  propel  a  gondola  himself,  and 
got  a  fall  into  the  "  deliciously  tepid  waters 
of  the  canal,"  as  he  called  them,  for  his 
pains ;  and  it  seemed  very  real,  so  minute 
were  the  details  into  which  he  entered. 

But  the  height  of  Bragdon's  realism  in 
telling  his  story  of  Venice  was  reached  when, 
diving  down  into  the  innermost  recesses  of 
his  vest  pocket,  he  brought  forth  a  silver 
filigree  effigy  of  a  gondola,  which  he  handed 
me  with  the  statement  that  it  was  for  me. 

"  I  got  that  in  the  plaza  of  St.  Marc's. 
I  had  visited  the  cathedral,  inspected  the 
mosaic  flooring,  taken  a  run  to  the  top  of 
the  campanile,  fed  the  pigeons,  and  was 
just  about  returning  to  the  palace,  when  I 
thought  of  you,  Phil,  getting  ready  to  do 
Rome  with  me,  and  I  thought  to  myself 
'  what  a  dear  fellow  he  is  !'  and,  as  I  thought 
that,  it  occurred  to  me  that  I'd  like  you  to 
know  I  had  you  in  mind  at  the  time,  and  so 
I  stopped  in  one  of  those  brilliant  little 


OF    THOMAS    BRAGDON  267 

shops  on  the  plaza,  where  they  keep  every 
thing  they  have  in  the  windows,  and  bought 
that.  It  isn't  much,  old  fellow,  but  it's  for 
remembrance'  sake." 

I  took  it  from  him  and  pressed  his  hand 
affectionately,  and  for  a  moment,  as  the  lit 
tle  sharpie  rose  and  fell  with  the  rising  and 
falling  of  the  slight  undulating  waves  made 
by  the  passing  up  to  anchorage  of  a  small 
steam-tug,  I  almost  believed  that  Tom  had 
been  to  Venice.  I  still  treasure  the  little 
filigree  gondola,  nor  did  I,  when  some  years 
later  I  visited  Venice,  see  there  anything  for 
which  I  would  have  exchanged  that  sweet 
token  of  remembrance. 

Bragdon,  as  will  already  have  been  sur 
mised  by  you  who  read,  was  more  of  a  hu 
morist  than  anything  else,  but  the  enthusi 
asm  of  his  humor,  its  absolute  spontaneity 
and  kindliness,  gave  it  at  times  a  semblance 
to  what  might  pass  for  true  poetry.  He  was 
by  disposition  a  thoroughly  sweet  spirit, 
and  when  I  realized  that  he  had  gone  be 
fore,  and  that  the  trips  he  and  I  had  looked 
forward  to  with-  such  almost  boyish  delight 
year  by  year  were  never  more  to  be  had, 


268  THE    LITERARY    REMAINS 

my  eyes  grew  wet,  and  for  a  time  I  was  dis 
consolate  ;  and  yet  one  week  later  I  was 
laughing  heartily  at  Bragdon. 

He  had  appointed  me,  it  was  found  when 
his  will  was  read,  his  literary  executor.  I 
fairly  roared  with  mirth  to  think  of  Brag- 
don's  having  a  literary  executor,  for,  imagi 
native  and  humorous  as  he  undoubtedly 
was,  he  had  been  so  thoroughly  identified 
in  my  mind  with  the  produce  business  that 
I  could  scarcely  bring  myself  to  think  of 
him  in  the  light  of  a  literary  person.  In 
deed,  he  had  always  seemed  to  me  to  have 
an  intolerance  of  literature.  I  had  taken 
but  half  of  a  spirit  trip  with  him  when  I  dis 
covered  that  he  relied  more  upon  his  own 
imagination  for  facts  of  interest  than  upon 
what  could  be  derived  from  books.  He 
showed  this  trait  no  more  strongly  than 
when  we  came,  upon  this  same  Italian  tour 
of  which  I  have  already  written  at  some 
length,  to  do  Rome  together,  for  I  then  dis 
covered  how  imaginary  indeed  the  trips 
were  from  his  point  of  view.  What  seemed 
to  him  as  proper  to  be  was,  and  neither  his 
tory  nor  considerations  of  locality  ever  inter- 


OF   THOMAS    BRAGDON  269 

fered  with  the  things  being  as  he  desired 
them  to  be.  Had  it  been  otherwise  he  never 
would  have  endeavored  to  make  me  believe 
that  he  had  stood  upon  the  very  spot  in  the 
Colosseum  where  Caesar  addressed  the  Ro 
man  mob  in  impassioned  words,  exhorting 
them  to  resist  the  encroachment  upon  their 
liberties  of  the  Pope  ! 

At  first  it  seemed  to  me  that  my  late  friend 
was  indulging  in  a  posthumous  joke,  and  I 
paid  his  memory  the  compliment  of  seeing 
the  point.  But  when,  some  days  later,  I 
received  a  note  from  his  executors  stating 
that  they  had  found  in  the  store-room  of 
Bragdon's  house  a  large  packing-box  full  of 
papers  and  books,  upon  the  cover  of  which 
was  tacked  a  card  bearing  my  address,  I 
began  to  wonder  whether  or  not,  after  all, 
the  imagination  of  my  dead  friend  had  real 
ly  led  him  to  believe  that  he  possessed  liter 
ary  ability. 

I  immediately  sent  word  to  the  executors 
to  have  the  box  forwarded  to  me  by  express, 
and  awaited  its  coming  with  no  little  inter 
est,  and,  it  must  be  confessed,  with  some 
anxiety;  for  I  am  apt  to  be  depressed  by 


270  THE    LITERARY    REMAINS 

the  literary  lucubrations  of  those  of  my 
friends  who,  devoid  of  the  literary  quality, 
do  yet  persist  in  writing,  and  for  as  long  a 
time  as  I  had  known  Bragdon  I  had  never 
experienced  through  him  any  sensations 
save  those  of  exhilaration,  and  I  greatly 
feared  a  posthumous  breaking  of  the  spell. 
Poet  in  feeling  as  I  thought  him,  I  could 
hardly  imagine  a  poem  written  by  my  friend, 
and  while  I  had  little  doubt  that  I  could 
live  through  the  reading  of  a  novel  or  short 
prose  sketch  from  his  pen,  I  was  apprehen 
sive  as  to  the  effect  of  a  possible  bit  of 
verse. 

It  seemed  to  me,  in  short,  that  a  poem  by 
Bragdon,  while  it  might  easily  show  the 
poet's  fancy,  could  not  fail  to  show  also  the 
produce-broker's  clumsiness  of  touch.  His 
charm  was  the  spontaneity  of  his  spoken 
words,  his  enthusiastic  personality  disarm 
ing  all  criticism ;  what  the  labored  produc 
tions  of  his  fancy  might  prove  to  be,  I  hardly 
dared  think.  It  was  this  dread  that  induced 
me,  upon  receipt  of  the  box,  appalling  in  its 
bulk  and  unpleasantly  suggestive  of  the  de 
parture  to  other  worlds  of  the  original  con- 


BUT  FINALLY  I  OPENED  THE  BOX  " 


OF    THOMAS    BRAGDON  273 

signer,  since  it  was  long  and  deep  like  the 
outer  oaken  covering  of  a  casket,  to  delay 
opening  it  for  some  days ;  but  finally  I 
nerved  myself  up  to  the  duty  that  had  de 
volved  upon  me,  and  opened  the  box. 

It  was  full  to  overflowing  with  printed 
books  in  fine  bindings,  short  tales  in  Brag- 
don's  familiar  hand  in  copy-books,  man 
uscripts  almost  without  number,  three 
Russia -leather  record  -  books  containing, 
the  title-page  told  me,  that  which  I  most 
dreaded  to  find,  The  Poems  of  Thomas  Brag- 
don,  and  dedicated  to  "  His  Dearest  Friend  " 
— myself.  I  had  no  heart  to  read  beyond 
the  dedication  that  night,  but  devoted  all 
my  time  to  getting  the  contents  of  the  box 
into  my  library,  having  done  which  I  felt  it 
absolutely  essential  to  my  happiness  to  put 
on  my  coat,  and,  though  the  night  was 
stormy,  to  rush  out  into  the  air.  I  think  I 
should  have  suffocated  in  an  open  field  with 
those  literary  remains  of  Thomas  Bragdon 
heaped  about  me  that  night. 

On  my  return  I  went  immediately  to  bed, 
feeling  by  no  means  in  the  mood  to  read 
The  Poems  of  Thomas  Bragdon,  I  tossed 


274  THE    LITERARY    REMAINS 

about  through  the  night,  sleeping  little, 
and  in  the  morning  rose  up  unrefreshed, 
and  set  about  the  examination  of  the  papers 
and  books  intrusted  to  my  care  by  my  de 
parted  friend.  And  oh,  the  stuff  I  found 
there  !  If  I  was  depressed  at  starting  in,  I 
was  stupefied  when  it  was  all  over,  for  the 
collection  was  mystifying  to  the  point  that 
it  stunned. 

In  the  first  place,  on  opening  Volume  I. 
of  the  Poems  of  Thomas  Bragdon,  the  first 
thing  to  greet  my  eyes  were  these  lines  : 


CONSTANCY 

Often  have  I  heard  it  said 

That  her  lips  are  ruby-red  : 

Little  heed  I  what  they  say, 

I  have  seen  as  red  as  they. 

Ere  she  smiled  on  other  men, 

Real  rubies  were  they  then. 

But  now  her  lips  are  coy  and  cold  ; 

To  mine  they  ne'er  reply  ; 
And  yet  I  cease  not  to  behold 

The  love-light  in  her  eye : 
Her  very  frowns  are  fairer  far 
Than  smiles  of  other  maidens  are. 


OF    THOMAS    BRAGDON  275 

As  I  read  I  was  conscious  of  having  seen 
the  lines  somewhere  before,  and  yet  I  could 
not  place  them  for  the  moment.  They  cer 
tainly  possessed  merit,  so  much  so,  in  fact, 
that  I  marvelled  to  think  of  their  being 
Bragdon's.  I  turned  the  leaves  further  and 
discovered  this  : 

DISAPPOINTMENT 

Come  to  me,  O  ye  children, 
For  I  hear  you  at  your  play, 

And  the  questions  that  perplexed  me 
Have  vanished  quite  away. 

The  Poem  of  the  Universe 

Nor  rhythm  has  nor  rhyme; 
Some  God  recites  the  wondrous  song, 

A  stanza  at  a  time. 

I  dwell  not  now  on  what  may  be; 

Night  shadows  o'er  the  scene; 
But  still  my  fancy  wanders  free 

Through  that  which  might  have  been. 

Two  stanzas  in  the  poem,  the  first  and 
the  last,  reminded  me,  as  did  the  lines  on 
"  Constancy,"  of  something  I  had  read  be- 


276  THE    LITERARY   REMAINS 

fore.  In  a  moment  I  had  placed  the  first  as 
the  opening  lines  of  Longfellow's  "  Chil 
dren,"  and  a  search  through  my  books 
showed  that  the  concluding  verse  was  taken 
bodily  from  Peacock's  exquisite  little  poem 
"  Castles  in  the  Air." 

Despairing  to  solve  the  problem  that  now 
confronted  me,  which  was,  in  brief,  what 
Bragdon  meant  by  bodily  lifting  stanzas 
from  the  poets  and  making  them  over  into 
mosaics  of  his  own,  I  turned  from  the 
poems  and  cast  my  eyes  over  some  of  the 
bound  volumes  in  the  box. 

The  first  of  these  to  come  to  hand  was  a 
copy  of  Hamlet,  bound  in  tree  calf,  the  sole 
lettering  on  the  book  being  on  the  back,  as 
follows : 


OF   THOMAS    BRAGDON  277 

This  I  deemed  a  harmless  bit  of  vanity, 
and  not  necessarily  misleading,  since  many 
collectors  of  books  see  fit  to  have  their  own 
names  emblazoned  on  the  backs  of  their 
literary  treasures  ;  but  pray  imagine  my  hor 
ror  upon  opening  the  volume  to  discover 
that  the  name  of  William  Shakespeare  had 
been  erased  from  the  title-page,  and  that  of 
Thomas  Bragdon  so  carefully  inserted  that 
except  to  a  practised  eye  none  would  ever 
know  that  the  page  was  not  as  it  had  always 
been.  I  must  confess  to  some  mirth  when 
I  read  that  title-page  : 


HAMLET,  PRINCE  OF  DENMARK 


BY 

THOMAS  BRAGDON,  ESQUIRE 


The  conceit  was  well  worthy  of  my  late 
friend  in  one  of  his  most  fanciful  moods. 
In  other  volumes  the  same  substitution  had 


278  THE    LITERARY   REMAINS 

been  made,  so  that  to  one  not  versed  in  lit 
erature  it  would  have  seemed  as  though 
"  Thomas  Bragdon,  Esquire,"  had  been  the 
author  not  only  of  Hamlet,  but  also  of  Van 
ity  Fair,  David  Copperfield,  Rienzi,  and  many 
other  famous  works,  and  I  am  not  sure  but 
that  the  great  problem  concerning  the  "  Ju- 
nius  Letters"  was  here  solved  to  the  satis 
faction  of  Bragdon,  if  not  to  my  own.  There 
were  but  two  exceptions  in  the  box  to  the 
rule  of  substituting  the  name  of  Bragdon 
for  that  of  the  actual  author ;  one  of  these 
was  an  Old  Testament,  on  the  fly-leaf  of 
which  Bragdon  had  written,  "  To  my  dear 
friend  Bragdon,"  and  signed  "  The  Author." 
I  think  I  should  have  laughed  for  hours 
over  this  delightful  reminder  of  my  late 
friend's  power  of  imagination  had  not  the 
second  exception  come  almost  immediately 
to  hand — a  copy  of  Milton,  which  I  recog 
nized  at  once  as  one  I  had  sent  Tom  at 
Christmas  two  years  before  his  death,  and 
on  the  fly-leaf  of  which  I  had  written,  "  To 
Thomas  Bragdon,  with  the  love  of,  his  faith 
fully,  Philip  Marsden."  This  was,  indeed, 
a  commonplace  enough  inscription,  but  it 


OF   THOMAS    BRAGDON  279 

gathered  unexpected  force  when  I  turned 
over  a  leaf  and  my  eyes  rested  on  the  title, 
where  Bragdon's  love  of  substitutes  had  led 
him  to  put  my  name  where  Milton's  had 
been. 

The  discovery  was  too  much  for  my  equa 
nimity.  I  was  thoroughly  disconcerted,  al 
most  angry,  and  I  felt,  for  the  first  time  in 
my  life,  that  there  had  been  vagaries  in 
Bragdon's  character  with  which  I  could  not 
entirely  sympathize ;  but  in  justice  to  my 
self,  it  must  be  said,  these  sentiments  were 
induced  by  first  thoughts  only.  Certainly 
there  could  be  but  one  way  in  which  Brag 
don's  substitution  of  my  name  for  Milton's 
could  prove  injurious  or  offensive  to  me 
who  was  his  friend,  and  that  was  by  his  put 
ting  that  copy  out  before  the  world  to  be 
circulated  at  random,  which  avenue  to  my 
discomfiture  he  had  effectually  closed  by 
leaving  the  book  in  my  hands,  to  do  with 
it  whatsoever  I  pleased.  Second  thoughts 
showed  me  that  it  was  only  a  fear  of  what 
the  outsider  might  think  that  was  responsi 
ble  for  my  temporary  disloyalty  to  my  de 
parted  comrade's  memory,  and  then  when  I 


280  THE   LITERARY    REMAINS 

remembered  how  thoroughly  we  twain  had 
despised  the  outsider,  I  was  so  ashamed  of 
my  aberration  that  1  immediately  renewed 
my  allegiance  to  the  late  King  Tom ;  so 
heartily,  in  fact,  that  my  emotions  wellnigh 
overcame  me,  and  I  found  it  best  to  seek 
distractions  in  the  outer  world. 

I  put  on  my  hat  and  took  a  long  walk 
along  the  Riverside  Drive,  the  crisp  air  of 
the  winter  night  proving  a  tonic  to  my  dis 
turbed  system.  It  was  after  midnight  when 
I  returned  to  my  apartment  in  a  tolerably 
comfortable  frame  of  mind,  and  yet  as  I 
opened  the  door  to  my  study  I  was  filled 
with  a  vague  apprehension — of  what  I  could 
not  determine,  but  which  events  soon  justi 
fied,  for  as  I  closed  the  door  behind  me, 
and  turned  up  the  light  over  my  table,  I  be 
came  conscious  of  a  pair  of  eyes  fixed  upon 
me.  Nervously  whirling  about  in  my  chair 
and  glancing  over  towards  my  fireplace,  I 
was  for  a  moment  transfixed  with  terror,  for 
there,  leaning  against  the  mantel  and  gazing 
sadly  into  the  fire,  was  Tom  Bragdon  him 
self — the  man  whom  but  a  short  time  before 
I  had  seen  lowered  into  his  grave. 


"GAZING   INTO   THE   FIRE   WAS   TOM   BRAGDON 


OF   THOMAS    BRAGDON  283 

"  Tom,"  I  cried,  springing  to  my  feet  and 
rushing  towards  him  —  "Tom,  what  does 
this  mean  ?  Why  have  you  come  back  from 
the  spirit  world  to — to  haunt  me  ?" 

As  I  spoke  he  raised  his  head  slowly  until 
his  eyes  rested  full  upon  my  own,  where 
upon  he  vanished,  all  save  those  eyes,  which 
remained  fixed  upon  mine,  and  filled  with 
the  soft,  affectionate  glow  I  had  so  often 
seen  in  them  in  life. 

"Tom,"  I  cried  again,  holding  out  my 
hand  towards  him  in  a  beseeching  fashion, 
"  come  back.  Explain  this  dreadful  mys 
tery  if  you  do  not  wish  me  to  lose  my 
senses." 

And  then  the  eyes  faded  from  my  sight, 
and  I  was  alone  again.  Horrified  by  my 
experience,  I  rushed  from  the  study  into  my 
bedroom,  where  I  threw  myself,  groaning, 
upon  my  couch.  To  collect  my  scattered 
senses  was  of  difficult  performance,  and 
when  finally  my  agitated  nerves  did  begin 
to  assume  a  moderately  normal  state,  they 
were  set  adrift  once  more  by  Tom's  voice, 
which  was  unmistakably  plain,  bidding  me 
to  come  back  to  him  there  in  the  study. 


284  THE   LITERARY    REMAINS 

Fearful  as  I  was  of  the  results,  I  could  not 
but  obey,  and  I  rose  tremblingly  from  my 
bed  and  tottered  back  to  my  desk,  to  see 
Bragdon  sitting  opposite  my  usual  place 
just  as  he  had  so  often  done  when  in  the 
flesh. 

"  Phil,"  he  said  in  a  moment,  "  don't  be 
afraid.  I  couldn't  hurt  you  if  I  would,  and 
you  know — or  if  you  don't  know  you  ought 
to  know — that  to  promote  your  welfare  has 
always  been  the  supremest  of  my  desires. 
I  have  returned  to  you  here  to-night  to  ex 
plain  my  motive  in  making  the  alterations 
in  those  books,  and  to  account  for  the  pe 
culiarities  of  those  verses.  We  have  known 
each  other,  my  dear  boy,  how  many  years  ?" 

"  Fifteen,  Tom,"  I  said,  my  voice  husky 
with  emotion. 

"Yes,  fifteen  years,  and  fifteen  happy 
years,  Phil.  Happy  years  to  me,  to  whom 
the  friendship  of  one  who  understood  me 
was  the  dearest  of  many  dear  possessions. 
From  the  moment  I  met  you  I  felt  I  had  at 
last  a  friend,  one  to  whom  my  very  self 
might  be  confided,  and  who  would  through 
all  time  and  under  all  circumstances  prove 


OF    THOMAS    BRAGDON  285 

true  to  that  trust.  It  seemed  to  me  that 
you  were  my  soul's  twin,  Phil,  and  as  the 
years  passed  on  and  we  grew  closer  to  each 
other,  when  the  rough  corners  of  my  nature 
adapted  themselves  to  the  curves  of  yours, 
I  almost  began  to  think  that  we  were  but 
one  soul  united  in  all  things  spiritual,  two 
only  in  matters  material.  I  never  spoke  of 
it  to  you ;  I  thought  of  it  in  communion 
with  myself ;  I  never  thought  it  necessary  to 
speak  of  it  to  you,  for  I  was  satisfied  that 
you  knew.  I  did  not  realize  until  —  until 
that  night  a  fortnight  since,  when  almost 
without  warning  I  found  myself  on  the 
threshold  of  the  dark  valley,  that  perhaps  I 
was  mistaken.  I  missed  you,  and  so  sudden 
was  the  attack,  and  so  swiftly  did  the  her 
alds  of  death  intrude  upon  me,  that  I  had 
no  time  to  summon  you,  as  I  wished ;  and 
as  I  lay  there  upon  my  bed,  to  the  watchers 
unconscious,  it  came  to  me,  like  a  dash  of 
cold  water  in  my  face,  that  after  all  \ve 
were  not  one,  but  in  reality  two ;  for  had 
we  been  one,  you  would  have  known  of  the 
perilous  estate  of  your  other  self,  and  would 
have  been  with  me  at  the  last.  And,  Phil, 


286  THE    LITERARY    REMAINS 

the  realization  that  chilled  my  very  soul, 
that  showed  me  that  what  I  most  dearly 
loved  to  believe  was  founded  in  unreality, 
reconciled  me  to  the  journey  I  was  about  to 
take  into  other  worlds,  for  I  knew  that 
should  I  recover,  life  could  never  seem  quite 
the  same  to  me." 

Here  Bragdon,  or  his  spirit,  stopped  speak 
ing  for  a  moment,  and  I  tried  to  say  some 
thing,  but  could  not. 

"  I  know  how  you  feel,  Phil,"  said  he,  no 
ticing  my  discomfiture,  "  for,  though  you  are 
not  so  much  a  part  of  me  that  you  thorough 
ly  comprehend  me,  I  have  become  so  much 
a  part  of  you  that  your  innermost  thoughts 
are  as  plain  to  me  as  though  they  were  mine. 
But  let  me  finish.  I  realized  when  I  lay  ill 
and  about  to  die  that  I  had  permitted  my 
theory  of  happiness  to  obscure  my  percep 
tion  of  the  actual.  As  you  know,  my  whole 
life  has  been  given  over  to  imagination — all 
save  that  portion  of  my  existence,  which  I 
shall  not  dignify  by  calling  life,  when  I  was 
forced  by  circumstances  to  .bring  myself 
down  to  realities.  I  did  not  live  whilst  in 
commercial  pursuits.  It  was  only  when  I 


OF    THOMAS    BRAGDON  287 

could  leave  business  behind  and  travel  in 
fancy  wheresoever  I  wished  that  I  was  hap 
py,  and  in  those  moments,  Phil,  I  was  full  of 
aspiration  to  do  those  things  for  which  nat 
ure  had  not  fitted  me,  and  to  the  extent 
that  I  recognized  my  inability  to  do  those 
things  I  failed  to  be  content.  I  should  have 
liked  to  be  a  great  writer,  a  poet,  a  great 
dramatist,  a  novelist — a  little  of  everything 
in  the  literary  world.  I  should  have  liked 
to  know  Shakespeare,  to  have  been  the 
friend  of  Milton  ;  and  when  I  came  out  of 
my  dreams  it  made  me  unhappy  to  think 
that  such  I  never  could  be,  until  one  day 
this  idea  came  to  me  :  all  the  happiness  of 
life  is  bound  up  in  the  '  let's  pretend  '  games 
which  we  learn  in  childhood,  and  no  harm 
results  to  any  one.  If  I  can  imagine  myself 
off  with  my  friend  Phil  Marsden  in  the  lakes 
of  England  and  Scotland,  in  the  African  jun 
gle,  in  the  moon,  anywhere,  and  enter  so  far 
into  the  spirit  of  the  trips  as  to  feel  that 
they  are  real  and  not  imagination,  why  may 
I  not  in  fancy  be  all  these  things  that  I  so 
aspire  to  be  ?  Why  may  not  the  plays  of 
Shakespeare  become  the  plays  of  Thomas 


288  THE    LITERARY    REMAINS 

Bragdon  ?  Why  may  not  the  poems  of  Mil 
ton  become  the  poems  of  my  dearest,  closest 
friend  Phil  Marsden  ?  What  is  to  prevent 
my  achieving  the  highest  position  in  letters, 
art,  politics,  science,  anything,  in  imagina 
tion  ?  I  acted  upon  the  thought,  and  I 
found  the  plan  worked  admirably  up  to  a 
certain  point.  It  was  easy  to  fancy  myself 
the  author  of  Hamlet  until  I  took  my  copy 
of  that  work  in  hand  to  read,  and  then  it 
would  shock  and  bring  me  back  to  earth 
again  to  see  the  name  of  another  on  the 
title  -  page.  My  solution  of  this  vexatious 
complication  was  soon  found.  Surely, 
.  thought  I,  it  can  harm  no  one  if  I  choose 
in  behalf  of  my  own  conceit  to  substitute 
my  name  for  that  of  Shakespeare,  and  I  did 
so.  The  illusion  was  complete ;  indeed,  it 
became  no  illusion,  for  my  eyes  did  not  de 
ceive  me.  I  saw  what  existed  :  the  title- 
page  of  Hamlet  by  Thomas  Bragdon.  I 
carried  the  plan  further,  and  where  I  found 
a  piece  of  literature  that  I  admired,  there  I 
made  the  substitution  of  my  name  for  that 
of  the  real  author,  and  in  the  case  of  that 
delightful  copy  of  Milton  you  gave  me,  Phil, 


OF    THOMAS    BRAGDON  289 

it  pleased  me  to  believe  that  it  was  present 
ed  to  me  by  the  author,  only  the  inscription 
on  the  title-page  made  it  necessary  for  me 
to  foist  upon  you  the  burden  or  distinction 
of  authorship.  Then,  as  I  lived  on  in  my 
imaginary  paradise,  it  struck  me  that  for  one 
who  had  done  such  great  things  in  letters  I 
was  doing  precious  little  writing,  and  I  be 
thought  me  of  a  plan  which  a  dreadful  re 
ality  made  all  the  more  pleasing.  I  looked 
into  literature  to  a  slight  extent,  and  I  per 
ceived  at  once  that  originality  is  no  longer 
possible.  The  great  thoughts  have  been 
thought;  the  great  truths  have  been  grasped 
and  made  clear  ;  the  great  poems  have  been 
written.  I  saw  that  the  literature  of  to-day  is 
either  an  echo  of  the  past  or  a  combination 
of  the  ideas  of  many  in  the  productions  of 
the  individual,  and  upon  that  basis  I  worked. 
My  poems  are  combinations.  I  have  taken 
a  stanza  from  one  poet,  and  combining  it 
with  a  stanza  from  another,  have  made  the 
resulting  poem  my  own,  and  in  so  far  as  I 
have  made  no  effort  to  profit  thereby  I  have 
been  clear  in  my  conscience.  No  one  has 
been  deceived  but  myself,  though  I  saw  with 


2QO  THE    LITERARY    REMAINS 

some  regret  this  evening  when  you  read  my 
lines  that  you  were  puzzled  by  them.  I  had 
believed  that  you  understood  me  sufficiently 
to  comprehend  them." 

Here  my  ghostly  visitor  paused  a  moment 
and  sighed.  I  felt  as  though  some  explana 
tion  of  my  lack  of  comprehension  early  in 
the  evening  was  necessary,  and  so  I  said: 

"I  should  have  understood  you, Tom,  and 
I  do  now,  but  I  have  not  the  strength  of  im 
agination  that  you  have." 

"  You  are  wrong  there,  Phil,"  said  he. 
"  You  have  every  bit  as  strong  an  imagina 
tion  as  I,  but  you  do  not  keep  it  in  form. 
You  do  not  exercise  it  enough.  How  have 
you  developed  your  muscles  ?  By  constant 
exercise.  The  imagination  needs  to  be  kept 
in  play  quite  as  much  as  the  muscles,  if  we 
do  not  wish  it  to  become  flabby  as  the  mus 
cles  become  when  neglected.  That  your 
imagination  is  a  strong  one  is  shown  by  my 
presence  before  you  to-night.  In  reality, 
Phil,  I  am  lying  out  there  in  Greenwood, 
cold  in  my  grave.  Your  imagination  places 
me  here,  and  as  applied  to  my  books,  the 
play  of  Hamlet  by  Thomas  Bragdon,  and 


OF    THOMAS    BRAGDON  291 

my  poems,  they  will  also  demonstrate  to  you 
the  strength  of  your  fancy  if  you  will  show 
them,  say,  to  your  janitor,  to-morrow  morn 
ing.  Try  it,  Phil,  and  see  ;  but  this  is  only 
a  part,  my  boy,  of  what  I  have  come  here  to 
say  to  you.  I  am  here,  in  the  main,  to  show 
you  that  throughout  all  eternity  happiness 
may  be  ours  if  we  but  take  advantage  of  our 
fancy.  Do  you  take  delight  in  my  society  ? 
Imagine  me  present,  Phil,  and  I  will  be 
present.  There  need  be  no  death  for  us, 
there  need  be  no  separation  throughout  all 
the  years  to  come,  if  you  but  exercise  your 
fancy  in  life,  and  when  life  on  this  earth 
ends,  then  shall  we  be  reunited  according 
to  nature's  laws.  Good-night,  Phil.  It  is 
late  ;  and  while  I  could  sit  here  and  talk 
forever  without  weariness,  you,  who  have 
yet  to  put  off  your  mortal  limitations,  will 
be  worn  out  if  I  remain  longer." 

We  shook  hands  affectionately,  and  Brag- 
don  vanished  as  unceremoniously  as  he  had 
appeared.  For  an  hour  after  his  departure 
I  sat  reflecting  over  the  strange  events  of 
the  evening,  and  finally,  worn  out  in  body 
and  mind,  dropped  off  into  sleep.  When  I 


292  THE    LITERARY    REMAINS 

awakened  it  was  late  in  the  forenoon,  and  I 
was  surprised  when  I  recalled  all  that  I  had 
gone  through  to  feel  a  sense  of  exhilaration. 
I  was  certainly  thoroughly  rested,  and  cares 
which  had  weighed  rather  heavily  on  me  in 
the  past  now  seemed  light  and  inconsider 
able.  My  apartments  never  looked  so  at 
tractive,  and  on  my  table,  to  my  utter  sur 
prise  and  delight,  I  saw  several  objects  of 
art,  notably  a  Barye  bronze,  that  it  had  been 
one  of  my  most  cherished  hopes  to  possess. 
Where  they  came  from  I  singularly  enough 
did  not  care  to  discover ;  suffice  it  to  say 
that  they  have  remained  there  ever  since, 
nor  have  I  been  at  all  curious  to  know  to 
whose  generosity  I  owe  them,  though  when 
that  afternoon  I  followed  Bragdon's  advice, 
and  showed  his  book  of  poems  and  the 
volume  of  Hamlet  to  the  janitor,  a  vague 
notion  as  to  how  matters  really  stood  en 
tered  my  mind.  The  janitor  cast  his  eye 
over  the  leather-covered  book  of  poems 
when  I  asked  what  he  thought  of  it. 

"  Nothin'  much,"  he  said.  "  You  goin'  to 
keep  a  diary  ?" 

"  What  do  you  mean  ?"  I  asked. 


YOU    COIN*    TO    KEEP   A    DIARY  ?' 


OF   THOMAS    BRAGDON  295 

"  Why,  when  I  sees  people  with  handsome 
blank-books  like  that  I  allus  supposes  that's 
their  object." 

Blank-book  indeed !  And  yet,  perhaps,  he 
was  not  wrong.  I  did  not  question  it,  but 
handed  him  the  Bragdon  Hamlet. 

"  Read  that  page  aloud  to  me,"  I  said,  in 
dicating  the  title-page  and  turning  my  back 
upon  him,  almost  dreading  to  hear  him 
speak. 

"  Certainly,  if  you  wish  it;  but  aren't  you 
feeling  well  this  morning,  Mr.  Marsden  ?" 

"Very,"  I  replied,  shortly.  "Go  on  and 
read." 

"  Hamlet,  Prince  of  Denmark,"  he  read, 
in  a  halting  sort  of  fashion. 

"  Yes,  yes ;  and  what  else  ?"  I  cried,  im 
patiently. 

"A  Tragedy  by  William  Shak— " 

That  was  enough  for  me.  I  understood 
Tom,  and  at  last  I  understood  myself.  I 
grasped  the  book  from  the  janitor's  hands, 
rather  roughly,  I  fear,  and  bade  him  begone. 

The  happiest  period  of  my  life  has  elapsed 
since  then.  I  understand  that  some  of  mv 


296        REMAINS    OF    THOMAS    BRAGDON 

friends  profess  to  believe  me  queer ;  but  I 
do  not  care.     I  am  content. 

The  world  is  practically  mine,  and  Brag- 
don  and  I  are  always  together. 


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